Live 8

Stu H · Post by **Stu H** » Mon Jul 04, 2005 7:28 am

How well were the live 8 concerts recieved in the US?

Henke · Post by **Henke** » Mon Jul 04, 2005 7:39 am

on the telly, the US show seemed to be the smallest one of all. The one in the UK seemed huge, like ten times more people in the audience than in the US.
I really do hope they drop the debts.

OnTheMoor · Post by **OnTheMoor** » Mon Jul 04, 2005 1:07 pm

I think that the one in Hyde park was about 10 times the size of any of the others.

We had a bit of a chuckle at ours. Held in Barrie, which is not exactly up there with London, Berlin, Rome or even Philadelphia. But it was good fun from what I saw. Media roasted it, but I'll take Barenaked Ladies, Gordon Lightfoot, Neil Daimond, Our Lady Peace and Great Big Sea over Beyonce and Will Smith anyday.

SteveShaw · Post by **SteveShaw** » Mon Jul 04, 2005 4:10 pm

I was at the one at the Eden Project in Cornwall. All the acts were African. It was a fabulous day. There was no sidelining of the politics at all. Africa's problems, within and without, were to the fore but equally the day was a celebration of the continent's wonderful diversity and vibrancy of its peoples and cultures. It was about as far removed as you could imagine from being a tawdry pop concert more concerned with the self-aggrandizement of a few ageing rock bands than with helping the world's poor. Well, that's what I thought and I was there!

Steve

OutOfBreath · Post by **OutOfBreath** » Mon Jul 04, 2005 8:16 pm

SteveShaw wrote:...It was about as far removed as you could imagine from being a tawdry pop concert more concerned with the self-aggrandizement of a few ageing rock bands than with helping the world's poor...

From what little I bothered to watch of it you described the US version perfectly!

Unseen122 · Post by **Unseen122** » Tue Jul 05, 2005 12:34 am

OnTheMoor wrote:
Media roasted it, but I'll take Barenaked Ladies, Gordon Lightfoot, Neil Daimond, Our Lady Peace and Great Big Sea over Beyonce and Will Smith anyday.

Amen.

mukade · Post by **mukade** » Tue Jul 05, 2005 2:25 am

I watched a bit of the the net broadcast, which was a surprisingly steady stream.

I think the concert showed there a has been a shift in musical tastes since the first Live Aid. Back then, it was the rock bands such as Queen who played the crowd. From what I saw and read, the biggest crowd pleaser in London was rapper Snoop Dog.

I think the complaints about there not being enough black artists included in the original lineup were justified.

Mukade

SteveShaw · Post by **SteveShaw** » Tue Jul 05, 2005 2:55 am

You can see a collection of photos from the Eden Project event ("Africa Calling") on the BBC website (my daughter's in photo 21 - bottom right, pink bag-strap on shoulder!) http://www.bbc.co.uk/music/thelive8event/pics/eden/?1 or watch videos of a lot of the performers http://www.bbc.co.uk/cornwall/live8/ (click Africa Calling). The line-up was all-African, all day, from 1pm to 11pm (except for Dido who did two songs with Youssou N'Dour

). Geldof didn't want "unknown" Africans at Hyde Park in case it put people off watching, and Andy Kershaw accused Eden of ghettoising African performers. I've never heard such twaddle in my life. The fact is, Cornwall did it right (proper job, as we say around here!). As Peter Gabriel (who helped to organise the Eden gig) said, Geldof shot himself in the foot this time. The Eden concert was superb musically and the cause in question was appropriately to the fore all day (whatever your views of it). Unforgettable.

Steve

Henke · Post by **Henke** » Tue Jul 05, 2005 7:39 am

OnTheMoor wrote:I'll take Barenaked Ladies, Gordon Lightfoot, Neil Daimond, Our Lady Peace and Great Big Sea over Beyonce and Will Smith anyday.

Did GBS play? ****, I don't think they ever showed that on tv here, I would have loved to see that.

djm · Post by **djm** » Tue Jul 05, 2005 8:05 am

Steve, this is just a guess, and not intended to be inflamatory or anything, but is it possible that there is a bigger influx of Africans to GB and parts of Europe, or that they may not be a significant enough presence in other parts of the world to have "recognized" African musicians available for the concerts? This may explain why organizers went for what would be more popular in certain countries.

djm

GaryKelly · Post by **GaryKelly** » Tue Jul 05, 2005 8:17 am

It certainly didn't harm sales for some of the has-beens:

LIVE 8 STARS' ALBUMS BOOST
1 Pink Floyd - Echoes: The Best of Pink Floyd - 1343%
2 The Who - Then and Now - 863%
3 Annie Lennox - Eurythmics Greatest Hits - 500%
4 Dido - Life For Rent - 412%
5 Razorlight - Up All Night - 335%
6 Robbie Williams - Greatest Hits - 320%
7 Joss Stone - Mind, Body and Soul - 309%
8 Sting - The Very Best of Sting & The Police - 300%
9 Travis - Singles - 268%
10 Madonna - Immaculate Collection - 200%
Source: HMV

From: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainmen ... 651309.stm

SteveShaw · Post by **SteveShaw** » Tue Jul 05, 2005 8:31 am

GaryKelly wrote:It certainly didn't harm sales for some of the has-beens:

LIVE 8 STARS' ALBUMS BOOST
1 Pink Floyd - Echoes: The Best of Pink Floyd - 1343%
2 The Who - Then and Now - 863%
3 Annie Lennox - Eurythmics Greatest Hits - 500%
4 Dido - Life For Rent - 412%
5 Razorlight - Up All Night - 335%
6 Robbie Williams - Greatest Hits - 320%
7 Joss Stone - Mind, Body and Soul - 309%
8 Sting - The Very Best of Sting & The Police - 300%
9 Travis - Singles - 268%
10 Madonna - Immaculate Collection - 200%
Source: HMV

From: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainmen ... 651309.stm

You can't help feeling a bit queasy when you read that. I wonder whether the "stars" in question will donate their extra profits (along with the record companies, retail outlets, etc. etc.) to appropriate causes. Call me Mr Cynic but I doubt it somehow. The African acts I saw at Eden were livelier, more accomplished (more PROFESSIONAL) and a damn sight more dynamic than anything I saw on the telly from Hyde Park (we recorded it). Geldof may even have suspected that some - MOST - of them would have upstaged some of the owld lags on offer in the park. The most exciting thing Madonna did was to swear (my mum went mad!) - and did we have to have Hey bloody Jude again....arrrgh!

Steve

The Weekenders · Post by **The Weekenders** » Tue Jul 05, 2005 10:25 am

Anyone else experience the "wince wave" that washed over the Casa Weekender during the Annie Lennox performance?

Wombat · Post by **Wombat** » Tue Jul 05, 2005 10:38 am

Forgive me for interrupting some thoroughly well-deserved cynicism by pointing out that the exercise, as I understood it, was not to alert an indifferent world to the wonders of African music but rather to alert people in the developed world, many of whom couldn't find Africa on a map, to the connection between the behaviour of developed nations and poverty in Africa.

My experience of playing so-called world music to people who are interested in pop is that they soon go into the next room and put on the music they wanted to listen to all along. It isn't African music.

You could easily have found a couple of dozen African acts who'd have put on a fantastic show and who are well-known to largish niche markets in the west. But I suspect the people who watched would have been people who already understood the political situation, more or less. It wouldn't have been a massive audience.

The Weekenders · Post by **The Weekenders** » Tue Jul 05, 2005 11:01 am

I felt squeamish watchin' Madonna yank around that Ethiopian girl. Took a good moment and turned it into a crass one.