Stuff You Should Know - Remembering Live Aid

Episode Date: May 7, 2019

Live Aid was a revolutionary concert event in two countries in 1985 that spanned the world via satellite. The brainchild of musician Bob Geldof, it really did help change the world in many ways, but its direct impact on Ethiopian famine relief remains in question. Listen and learn today!  Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

On the podcast, Hey Dude, the 90s called, David Lasher and Christine Taylor, stars of the cult classic show, Hey Dude, bring you back to the days of slip dresses and choker necklaces. We're gonna use Hey Dude as our jumping off point, but we are going to unpack and dive back into the decade of the 90s.

We lived it, and now we're calling on all of our friends to come back and relive it. Listen to Hey Dude, the 90s called on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Lance Bass, host of the new iHeart podcast, Frosted Tips with Lance Bass. Do you ever think to yourself, what advice would Lance Bass

and my favorite boy bands give me in this situation? If you do, you've come to the right place because I'm here to help. And a different hot, sexy teen crush boy bander each week to guide you through life. Tell everybody, ya everybody, about my new podcast and make sure to listen so we'll never, ever have to say. Bye, bye, bye.

Listen to Frosted Tips with Lance Bass on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Welcome to Step You Should Know, a production of iHeart radios, How Stuff Works. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and there's Charles W. Chuck Bryant, and there's Jerry over there,

and this is Step You Should Know in the House. Yes. I think we should say what just happened of Mike, because as Jerry does once every 300 episodes, she realizes what we're recording on and has an actual comment about it. And this is about Live Aid, and she went, I was in London when Live Aid happened,

and Josh said, did you go? Jerry said, no, I didn't know it was happening. Because we forget, in 1985, there wasn't an internet blast. Live Aid was a big deal, but little Jerry, little 12-year-old Jerry in London didn't know what's going on. To get any info, you have to go down to the corner and look at the telephone pole

and see if somebody's stapled there. Yeah, or go to hear the town crier on his soapbox in the park, Hyde Park. Sure. So it was a very anti-climactic story because it led to nothing, but anyway, I was there. Yeah, her justification was, I was 12. Yeah.

I had no controller agency over my life. Probably true. But Jerry, had you been just three years older, you might have been pulled up on stage with Bono to dance. To dance to dancing in the dark. No, that was for Springsteen. And Courtney Cox. He did not play Live Aid.

You know that was Courtney Cox though, right? Sure, it was not real. It was set up. She was an actor, and still is. I thought it was just coincidence. But yeah, one of the most famous moments of Live Aid was when Bono, and we'll get there, but I watched it again today, man.

I got a little teary. Did you? It was such a great moment. Oh, I just wanted to be like, Bono, stop, no. That's what everyone in the band was doing. I'm sure. It was like, you could, Ed still had hair. It was before he just started wearing beanies all the time.

And they were playing the great song, Bad, and they did like a 17 minute version of their like 22 minute set, because Bono wanted to dance with a girl. And he finally jumped down onto the floor of Wimbley Stadium. Got this young 15 year old girl, dance with her for like 15 seconds. Took another five minutes to get back to the stage,

because that's how long it takes to get back up on stage. Look at Panic starts crossing his face as he realizes what's going on. And Ed is up there, and Adam Clayton has his big white afro, and Larry Mullen still looks identical as he always has. Is he the drummer? Yeah, and they just played that same riff from Bad over and over and over.

And they were a little mad, because they only got to do two songs. They were gonna close with Pride in the name of love. Which everybody like wanted to hear. Sure, it was a big hit. They were a young band at the time. Bono was only 25, and the band was a little miffed, but then as it turns out,

that became one of the iconic moments of Live Aid, and it really launched you two into the stratosphere. Yeah, which, I mean, Bono lucked out on that one, because I imagine backstage right after that set was not a pleasant place to be for him. Sure, they were like, dude, it's not about you. What are you doing? But it was a nice moment.

He said, I really wanted to dance with that 15 year old girl. I know, it was very sweet. Her name is Cal Coleek, and she says that she was getting kind of smushed, and that kind of helped her out, was security, like pulling her by her hair over the barrier. Yeah, it doesn't look very comfortable. It was rough.

I should probably say at this point, or we should, a lot of the stuff we're talking about, you can go see. I was actually, when I was researching this, I was like, what a time to be alive. Man, I was just pouring through these videos. Yeah, you can just go watch most of the stuff we're talking about,

is out there on YouTube. So if you ever just go, what? Pause, go to YouTube, youtube.com. Type in L-I-V-E-A-I-D. Yeah, you don't even need the dash. Their algorithm is that smart, it'll know what you're talking about. And start watching videos.

Yeah, I watched a bunch. We should just talk about some of the ones through the episode that we watched. Okay. The last thing I watched before we got up to record was Sabbath. I didn't watch that one. The Sabbath reunion.

And we'll also say, this was 1985, so when you think, man, Zeppelin reunion, Sabbath reunion, what that really means is like, chubby, big-haired Ozzy, and like Robert Plant wearing like, electric blue. And Z-Cavirici. Baggy pants. He was dressed like AC Slater from, say, by the bell.

Yeah, it's a big, fat 80s reminder, like, oh, right, that's what people look like. Yeah. Even John Deacon from Queen had like a big, puffy pleated outfit. Oh yeah, 85 was like, they had the 80s flag going. Yeah, it was very tough. Full bore.

But I was 14, and I think I've told this story before, but I was babysitting. I had an everyday summer babysitting gig as a 14-year-old babysitting, these two kids that were like... 17 and 19. Yeah. They were pretty close to my age, looking back.

They were probably like eight and nine or something. It's closest. So I was sort of like paid to go over there and kind of hang out with them and make sure they didn't get in trouble. Wasn't like babysitting, babysitting. Right. But I remember, I watched virtually all

of the live aid telecast on MTV. That's awesome. And was just stuck to it all day long. That's cool. I was nine. Yeah. And we were in London, but I didn't care. But you and Jerry were in Hyde Park hanging out.

She's like, there's this annoying nine-year-old just following me around, talking about podcasts. Says he's from the future. Right. Something about a way back machine. So yeah, thanks to Julia Layton, who we have doing some writing for us now. Dr. Lates.

From back in the old days. She's great and writes great stuff. And I threw live aid out there because I thought it'd be good to learn a little bit more about it. It was a good idea. Thanks. So let's talk about the origins of this.

Yes. Because live aid happened on July 13th, 1985. And the whole thing started. The seed was planted about six months before. Well, a little more than six months before, but not much more than that. When either the BBC or the CBC, depending on who you asked, ran a series of documentaries about a drought and famine

that was going on in Ethiopia at the time. And apparently no one knew about this. No one was reporting on it. It wasn't talked about. And today... It's hard to imagine that with our news cycle, but it was different back then. Right, but even still,

we became so indoctrinated from that point on in the idea of famine in Ethiopia that it's hard to think of not connecting the two, but no one knew about it. And no one knew about it until I should say that the CBC or BBC documentary series was aired. And it was powerful. There was a very famously a young girl,

let me see if I can find her name, who was, she looked like she was on the verge of death. Her head just kind of lolling around. She's skeletal. And she looks like at the camera at one point and became kind of the face of starving children in Ethiopia. Like really drove home what was going on there.

Her name was Birhan Woldu. And she's grown now and is an ambassador. I was afraid to ask. Kind of like, I don't think she's an official ambassador. She's kind of an unofficial ambassador for poverty, combating poverty and hunger. Well, I bet she knows Bono. I'm guaranteed she does.

But she really kind of drove home what was going on to viewers, including a guy from Ireland named Bob Geldof. Yeah, who Julia refers to as a B-list Irish rocker. It's probably pretty accurate. The Boomtown rats were a medium big band at best. He also, if you're a Pink Floyd fan, he played Pink in the movie, The Wall.

Oh, really? Yeah. I think you told me this every time Bob Geldof comes up. I think we talked about this before. Obviously there was no Pink in real life, but in the movie there was a character named Pink. By the way, which one's Pink?

Right, exactly. So Geldof, they had that great song, I don't know why I don't like Mondays. Pink Floyd did, that was the Boomtown rats, my friend. Yeah. You got that one plenty wrong. That was their big hit, though. That was Geldof's big hit.

Which, again, I thought was a Novus Castello song until you explained it to me. Oh, that's right. We definitely have talked about that before. So, man, I wonder if 20 years, if we're gonna just be like, remember when we... Yeah. It's already happened in Chuck.

But we don't sound like Abe Simpson quite yet. So Geldof saw this, really spoke to him, and he said, here's what we're gonna do. I wanna put together a fundraiser, and this is not Live Aid yet. No, this is Band Aid. Right, previous to Live Aid, they did the song that we,

some of us all still love around Christmas time. It's a good song. Some of us hate it. Who does? Do they know it's Christmas? Who hates that song? I think some people hate all Christmas music. Oh, yeah.

You know? Or, at the very least, get sick of certain songs. I can see that. Yeah. But that one is... That's a good one. Let me put it this way. I have never gotten sick of that one yet to this day.

No, I agree. Bono, of course. Boy George, Bowie, Bananaama, Duranduran, Wham, U2 Sting, Phil Collins. You name it. They sang on that song, and it benefited Ethiopian famine relief. That's what got the ball rolling.

Yeah, and again, this was Bob Geldof, saw this documentary, and started calling up everybody he knew, pulling all these strings, and put this together. And everyone was going, how did Bob Geldof get my number? Exactly. He's a B-list Cyrus Walker.

Right. He got this single produced and released by December. He saw the documentary in October. I know. So that kind of gives you a hint of the kind of dude Bob Geldof was. He gets things done. He lied, he bluffed, he didn't take no for an answer.

He got things done, for sure. But to him, it was always for the greater good. The ends definitely justified the means, especially if it meant manipulating spoiled rockers. Yeah, and we'll get to some more of that later. He for sure did. That song itself, though, by itself raised more than 10 million bucks,

and they have, over the years, done a few different versions. It seems like they updated every now and then with new whoever's the hot British rockers are at the time. Sure. Ed Sheeran, right? He was in the 2014 version, so it was One Direction. Okay.

They're the group, right? Yeah, okay. They're a super group. Oh. And then, well, I don't know if that's actually accurate or not, but then SEAL. You know, super group doesn't just mean they're super. That means.

Right, no, that's why I correct them. Okay, gotcha. And then, Shanae O'Connor, she was on it too. Oh, on the newer ones? The 2014 version of Do They Know It Was Christmas. Oh, nice. Yeah. So a month after that, Harry Belafonte got together

with a producer named Ken Kragan, or Kragan, and they said, well, we need to do our own version over here in the U.S. because we're looking pretty bad. Right. Geldorf is a B-list Irish rocker and he's getting all the limelight. I'm Harry Belafonte.

Right. So he gets together and they, this is where, and this is something I never knew. The song We Are The World, of course, is what we're talking about. I always heard USA for Africa. I always thought it was United States of America. That's what they wanted you to think.

I never knew that it stood for United Support of Artists for Africa. Right. Until today, or yesterday. Well, there you go. How about that? I think it's a great thing that they surreptitiously slipped that in.

And that song was, you know, Quincy Jones famously worked on it. It was written, it was supposed to be written by Lionel Richie, Michael Jackson, and Stevie Wonder. Stevie Wonder was too, wanted to work on it, but was a little too busy to get involved in the writing at the time. So it fell to Lionel Richie and Michael Jackson.

And apparently, if you believe Latoya Jackson, it was mostly Michael who put that song together. I don't know about that, man, because Lionel Richie's a pretty standup dude from everything I've ever heard. Well, I don't think he's made some claim, like I wrote half 50% of that song. He was apparently pretty blown away

because Michael Jackson, like after he left, went ahead and like cut a demo. Oh, really? And then he brought it back and he was like, oh, well that's impressive and exclusionary. Right, yeah, yeah, yeah, good ideas. Okay, go home. He's like, you literally waited

till I walked out the door to hit record. I'll see you later. I like to see Lionel Richie. I just looked up his, he played somewhere and I was like, what's he playing these days? I looked up his set list. Is he coming to Chastain anytime soon? I don't know, man, but the set list is amazing.

I'm like, every single song, because he's doing Commodore stuff, he's doing his own stuff. It's really, it seems like a fun show. A little bit of Deep Purple. Oh, sure. Do we take a break already? No, we haven't, Chuck,

and I think it's high time that we did. All right, let's do it. On the podcast, Hey Dude, the 90s called David Lasher and Christine Taylor, stars of the cult classic show, Hey Dude, bring you back to the days of slip dresses and choker necklaces. We're gonna use Hey Dude as our jumping off point, but we are going to unpack and dive back into the decade of the 90s.

We lived it, and now we're calling on all of our friends to come back and relive it. It's a podcast packed with interviews, co-stars, friends, and non-stop references to the best decade ever. Do you remember going to Blockbuster? Do you remember Nintendo 64? Do you remember getting Frosted Tips?

Was that a cereal? No, it was hair. Do you remember AOL Instant Messenger and the dial-up sound like poltergeist? So leave a code on your best friend's beeper, because you'll want to be there when the nostalgia starts flowing. Each episode will rival the feeling of taking out

the cartridge from your Game Boy, blowing on it and popping it back in as we take you back to the 90s. Listen to Hey Dude, the 90s, called on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Lance Bass, host of the new iHeart podcast, Frosted Tips with Lance Bass.

The hardest thing can be knowing who to turn to when questions arise or times get tough, or you're at the end of the road. Ah, okay, I see what you're doing. Do you ever think to yourself, what advice would Lance Bass and my favorite boy bands give me in this situation? If you do, you've come to the right place,

because I'm here to help. This, I promise you. Oh, God. Seriously, I swear. And you won't have to send an SOS, because I'll be there for you. Oh, man. And so, my husband, Michael.

Um, hey, that's me. Yep, we know that, Michael. And a different hot, sexy, teen crush boy bander each week to guide you through life, step by step. Oh, not another one. Kids, relationships, life in general can get messy. You may be thinking, this is the story of my life. Just stop now.

If so, tell everybody, yeah, everybody, about my new podcast and make sure to listen, so we'll never, ever have to say bye, bye, bye. Listen to Frosted Tips with Lance Bass on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. So, where we left off, Charles, was, I guess, probably, by this time, about January 1985 in USA for Africa,

which does not stand for USA, like you think. Released, We Are the World, because they were inspired by, do they know it's Christmas at all? And apparently, Boy George had an idea of going bigger and said to Geldorf, look, mate, you did pretty good, you raised $10 million, you inspired USA for Africa, which raised like $44 million within a year. But you can do more.

What if you put on, like, the biggest concert ever? Maybe you should do that, Boy George out. You're banished in a puff of smoke like he does. I'd like to see Boy George, too. I bet that's a fun show. You and I saw Culture Club, and they were good. How long ago, like within the last few years, I guess? Yeah, like the last two years.

It was at the original, dudes? Yes, as far as you know. As far as I know, yeah. And I actually learned at that show that we are never to let on that we're tired, because this is the penultimate show of the tour, and Boy George kept talking about it to the guitarists about how tired they were, and they just had

one more show after this. And it's not a good look, is it? I still love Boy George, but yes, it does not come off very well to the audience. Well, I'm not tired. I feel great. That's because we do two shows back-to-back once a quarter.

Oh, you mean live? Live, that's what I mean. Sure, sure. And we can talk about anything here. It's the live stuff. Right. I want to go see Adam and the Ants, too. I've been checking out their touring again.

Are they around? I don't know. I mean, it's Adam Ant, for sure. I don't know if it's any of the original Ants. Would you know the difference? No, but he's doing great, too. Sure. I like seeing these people coming back around, healthy,

and like the 80s did not kill them. Well, they're clearly taking a lot of dietary supplements, a lot of botanicals. So, like you said, from the point where do they know it's Christmas and the famine documentaries started rolling out, it was not very long after that they managed to pull off a concert in London and Philadelphia,

transmitted by 13 satellites to 160 countries to an audience that was 25% of the world's population. I saw at one point that they announced that 95% of the world's televisions were tuned in at some point to that broadcast. Wow. That's amazing. It is amazing.

And that's amazing today. It was spectacular in 1985. Yeah, and by comparison, the Summer Olympics the year before was only broadcast to 67 countries. Yeah, only. Yeah, sorry, 67 countries and Live Aid was 160. So, we cannot overestimate how huge of a deal this was. Right, and to just really kind of show off,

but also to kind of bind the Western world together. It was held, like you said, at two places at once, in London and in Philadelphia. And RFK Stadium. There were concerts going on constantly in both places in the show, what you would see on TV, what you watched when you were babysitting, would just kind of switch back and forth

depending on who had the bigger act at the time. Yeah, these days you could probably do a split screen or they would just show both on two channels. Yeah, but the fact that they were doing it at a time when, as Julia Layton puts it, during a time of cassette tapes and cathode ray tube TVs, it's just really impressive that Bob Geldof managed to put it together and help pull it off with very little problem.

Yeah, it was. In just a few months, too. 16 hours total for both of the shows. They overlap by about 10 hours. And then there are also various satellite concerts going on all over the world. Without, you know, they didn't have like 60 performers, but smaller shows kind of stage in conjunction.

Yeah, like I got the impression that people who had already booked their tours and were locked into a tour date, but still wanted to take part, kind of being their show in, yeah. Like Celine Dion, like doing a number from Las Vegas on New Year's Eve or something. So it all kicked off at 12 noon London time,

7 a.m. in the U.S. The Coldstream Guards played God Save the Queen. Charles and Diana came out on stage. I know that makes it pretty cool. It is pretty cool. The Diana part. Yeah, of course. What, no love for Charles?

I mean, sure. But he's still around. He's not a live aid type, you know what I mean? No. I think he irons his jeans. I don't think he wears jeans. Is it right? You know why?

Because he does an iron. He could probably find somebody to iron for him if he wanted to. So they take the stage at Wembley, they inaugurate live aid and then. Wait, hold on. Was that a Joker reference that just went over my head? What, ironing jeans?

That ironing thing, yeah. No. Okay. No. Because I'm getting like intel and feedback from listeners once in a while who write in. It was like, that was a hilarious reference Chuck made that went right over Josh's head.

I hate that. Really? Yes. You can't get all the references. I want to get all the references. All right. So do this from now on. Okay.

Josh is blinking at me, everyone. So to kick it off in anti-dramatic climactic fashion, that's not very cool to say. The band Status Quo was the first band. They were big in England. I guess. They were. But they were kind of corny.

They were legendary. I think their first hit single was in 1968. And this is 1985. Sure, they've been around the point. And do they got it off? Like if you watch Status Quo covering John Fogarty's Rockin' All Over the World. Which I did.

Like the stadium is bouncing with energy. So they were clearly popular over there. They were just never big in the States. No, but they still did a fine job. No, it was fine. An adequate workman-like way to kick off live. That's right. And who kicked it off in the US, Josh?

It was Joan Baez. Why not, right? Who came out and was like, this is your woodstock, it's long overdue. And they went, who are you? And she sang an acapella version of Amazing Grace. Oh, nice. Kind of clumsily leading the audience

by singing very quickly the next line. And then singing that same line in the Amazing Grace melody. That really is clunky. It was slightly clunky. But, you know, this is a good way to start the show. Sure. With Amazing Grace, good song.

With Status Quo and Joan Baez clunkily singing Amazing Grace. It got better from there, basically. Well, it did. There were 70 acts. Every act had 20 minutes, which was more or less how long they played. A few bands went over by a few minutes.

But it's not, if you've ever done a festival or something, it's like it's not cool to just be like, eh, we'll do one more tune. Right. It's just not something you do. No. I've never played a festival, but I can imagine. No, we've done festival stuff.

When? We do sketch fest every year. Oh, yeah, that's right. You did Outside Lands by yourself. Sure, but I didn't have the impression. Oh, yeah, they did kind of hustle me out of there. I was like, what else you got in the green room? And they're like, just go.

You're right. Okay, all right, I got you. I thought you were like, at the end of your end of the world thing, they were like, hey, anyone want to hear something about, like get him off. Oh, yeah. Phil Collins, and this was a very big deal

and a total publicity stunt, but it worked. Yeah. He, and I think we mentioned this in the Concord episode. Oh, we talked about it, yeah. He played both continents and they had a film crew following him around. They would cut to every once in a while, like Phil Collins on the plane

or hustling through an airport. There is no better singer than or now to have done this. Maybe today, maybe James Corden would be the go-to person, but this was Phil Collins. Yeah, yeah. I mean, like. There's no cynicism, no rock star. He was kind of goofy and fun.

Love that guy. I think you're totally right. Yeah, I love him. He's playing again too, which is great news. I didn't know that. Yeah, cause he wasn't able to play drums for a while and he's back at it. What happened?

He, I can't remember exactly what it is, but he had some illness. I can't remember exactly what, but where he like wasn't performing and didn't think he would again. Oh boy. Yeah, so it's kind of cool. He's back out there again.

He's great. Susudio and it up. That's awesome. I love that man. Because of the 20 minutes set, some bands got, you know, like you two only got in two songs. That was so dope. Generally it was about three,

some bands like Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers with their tight Don't Boris Get to the Chorus, they got in four. Oh, did they? Yeah, their set was epic. It's great. Who, somebody had like five I counted. Well, Queen did sort of some medleys.

And so they ended up getting more songs in there that way. There's somebody else though. I can't quite put my finger on, sorry everybody, but I saw one and I was like, wow, that's a lot more songs and it seems like everybody else had. They're probably, hurry up, hurry up. No banter.

So 170,000 people total were live at the two shows. But like we said, 25% of the world, 1.5 billion people watched it as it was happening. Pretty amazing. So on the actual day of the show, you already kicked it off, right? It started in London and then it started in Philadelphia two hours later.

San Francisco and John Baez. And then there was overlap for like 10 hours, I think. Yeah, 10 of the 16 hours. And then it went afterward, it went to, went back to Philadelphia. But Chuck, you saw Bohemian Rhapsody, right? Three times. Did you really see it three times?

That's adorable. Yeah. So that part at the end when they recreate Live Aid, did you see the YouTube video of the Live Aid version and the Bohemian Rhapsody version? I did not watch the side-by-side comparison because I did not need to. It is pretty close.

Yeah, I mean, I've watched that Live Aid performance dozens and dozens of times. Really? Yeah, and they nailed it. The thing that bothered me about that movie was how much they rewrote the timeline in the band. Oh, yeah. So it was not Queen's first performance back

and like they had just reunited and forgiven each other. And he had just told them about HIV, like none of that. Yeah. The timeline's so out of whack. Supposedly he didn't know he had HIV yet at the Live Aid show. I can't remember exactly, was that it? I'm pretty sure. But I mean, they took a lot of license.

They took a lot of license. And you know, it's fine. You're trying to make a more dramatic film, I get it. But I don't know if it needed it because that performance itself, still, if you look up any, what were the best performances of Live Aid, it's almost roundly Queen in the number one spot.

Yeah, and not just Live Aid, like a lot of people point to that as like one of the greatest minisets ever. No, the BBC did a poll in 2005 and that was named as the number one greatest rock performance of all time. That is really great. Man, it just gave me chills.

Pretty amazing. I got chills right now. Not even watching it, just hearing you talk about a BBC poll. Or if you're a medium writer, the article said it was like Adam touching God on the Sistine Chapel ceiling. Check.

Ben Franklin wielding a lightning rod. Okay. Or E.T. phoning home. No. Man. They had me right up into the last one right there. That's just so like, come on, just say it's great. I didn't get the last, it's like E.T. phoning home.

Yeah. Like I really tried to go in the writer's head too and I was like, nope, that was personal. Yeah. That person really was moved by E.T. phoning home or something. What else did we get? We got a lot of, anytime you have a big thing like this,

you have a lot of people collaborating on stage, Sting and Dire Straits of course. Well, yeah. Mick Jagger and Tina Turner, that was pretty unforgettable. But not just Mick Jagger and Tina Turner because it turns out that Tommy Metola who's the head of Sony Records said,

hey, if you don't get Hull and Oats on with Mick Jagger, Mick Jagger's not going on. And Hull and Oats backed up Tina Turner and Mick Jagger. Oh, really? Yeah. See, I thought that they were saying, if you don't give Hull and Oats a prime time slot, then Mick Jagger won't come

because he represented both. I think that that was there. They equivocated by saying, we'll have them back up Mick Jagger and Tina Turner. And even still, if you look up Hull and Oats, it just comes up Mick Jagger and Tina Turner. They're not even listed in the video anymore, but at least John Oats was backing them up.

I'm pretty sure Daryl Hall was too. Man, they were good. Yeah, still are. Emily, when saw them a couple of years ago, just killing it still. It's good stuff. I like that live at Daryl's house too, that show. I haven't seen that.

I don't know if he's still doing it, but he did it for a few years at least and it's basically his awesome home studio. He just has people over and a camera crew and they just jam and do songs. That's great. They'll do like a Hull and Oats song and then mainly the songs of the artist.

I feel like I've seen them. It's fun. Since they've been back around. Definitely saw tears for fears. Well, they played with them. That might have been. Yeah. They toured with them.

But we didn't stick around for Hull and Oats and I think the reason why is because we had seen Hull and Oats already. Yeah. Like what happened to my brain, John? Phil Collins, they got a lot out of Phil Collins because not only did he sing in both, he played drums with Eric Clapton.

He played drums with Led Zeppelin. Yeah, famously. Yeah. So let's talk about that Zeppelin performance. You can't dance around this any longer, Chuck. It was not very good. It was terrible. Yeah.

Like if you saw Led Zeppelin in like a 50 person club and they'd been drinking at the club the whole day, this is what you would expect to hear from him and you'd probably be like, that was awesome. Yeah. But for the first time back on stage together in five years since the death of their drummer, yeah.

They went out at like their peak. There wasn't a decline of Led Zeppelin. They were at their peak when Bonham died. According to me. Okay. You don't think so? No, I think their last album was kind of a disappointment. What was that, physical graffiti?

No, Kota. Oh. You're like, I haven't heard of that one. Okay. All right, fair enough. They were still huge and they still had plenty of music left to put out. So there were expectations on Zeppelin, okay?

Sure. Okay. And they come out and play just a terrible set. So much of that Phil Collins later on in his autobiography said I was really thinking about walking off stage in the middle and the reason I didn't is because I knew that people would be talking about to this day how Phil Collins ruined Led Zeppelin's set

not about how bad Led Zeppelin's set was. So he said he was air drumming, trying to keep out of the way. Because there were two drummers, so he could air drum. Yeah. Which he didn't realize there was gonna be two drummers. And he basically said it was just terrible. And if you watch it, it was pretty bad. I'm looking up Led Zeppelin now

because I don't wanna mess up. I thought you were texting. No, Presence was their final album, not Kota. What was on Presence? Oh, no, wait, In Through the Outdoor? See, this is what I'm saying, man. They were still very much at their peak. Oh, good Lord.

I can't believe I'm getting all this Zeppelin stuff wrong. Oh, Kota was released in 1982. Yeah, but that was after Bonhomme's death. It was a compilation album. Right, right. Okay, that's what I was thinking. So their last studio album would have been what, Presence or In Through the Outdoor?

I think Presence. Okay. Which didn't have much. Presence. Sorry, should we cut that joke? No, no, I like it. The dadness is becoming like full bore. Did I have a micro expression go over my face?

Quite a few. So yeah, I mean, if you watch Zeppelin's performance, they wanted it scrubbed from the world. You can still find like cruddy versions on YouTube. Not the official live aid version. No, no, no. Just like the guy that had the camera on his shoulder and is living room basically.

Apparently Santana requested the same thing. You can't find Santana set anymore. Oh, really? Because they said don't include that on the official version. It worked. Wow. No Streisand effect on them. Zeppelin's isn't the worst thing I've ever seen,

but Robert Plant was not in great form vocally. And he had met such, like they all look back and are like, eh, it wasn't great. No, Jimmy Page didn't do that great of a job either. It wasn't so horrendous that you're just like holding your nose. But it just wasn't anything like what everybody was hoping for.

Sabbath's was pretty good. I really, I gotta see that one. Junkie Big Hair at Ozzy, but. What else do you want from Ozzy? It was, they did Children of the Grave, Iron Man and Paranoid and it was pretty, you know. I want to say words here. We don't say on this show.

Be worded in? Yeah, it was. We say that, we've said that before. Really? Sure. All right, that was awesome. Okay. Live Aid at Wimbley ended at around 10 p.m.

with, do they know what's Christmas? They brought everyone that they could out on stage. Of course, Paul McCartney was there. The who was there. And then right after that ended, they switched the live feed over to Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers with their great, great set. They did American Girl, Refugee, The Waiting and Rebels

and 85 despite the clothes that was still like kind of peak Tom Petty too. Sure. I think. Despite, the clothes really got to you, huh? Yeah, it's just kind of, you think of these classic rockers and then you see them in Cavalry Cheese and like day glow. I think it's dope.

You like it? Bob Dylan was there, man. He actually, Bob Dylan very famously like will not pick up an acoustic guitar and like play his old folk standards anymore. Did he on this one? Yeah, he played Blown in the Wind. And he was dressed almost identically to the Fresh Prince.

That would have been really, really disappointing. The 80s. Oh my Lord. And then they closed the Philly show with We Are the World. Right. And whoever was there who could chip in like Kenny Loggins and Sheena Easton and. Melissa Manchester.

Man, this is so 80s. Do you remember her? Yeah. Oh yeah. Okay, I had to look her up. I think I know the name, but she's saying don't cry out loud. Good song. Theme from Ice Castles.

Yeah, that's our mutual friend Allison that we used to work with. Call us those carsick songs. Cause it just reminds her of like being in the back of a station wagon. Listening to AM Radio and being like carsick. I think it's a good thing. So they raised about 125 million bucks,

which is about 300 million today. Donations did pick up when Queen played. They over kind of, they really played that up in the movie. But they did have an uptick when Queen went on because it was such a great performance. Yeah, I think Geldof was kind of anticipating like the phone has to be ringing off the hook the whole time. And he got very frustrated visibly

several times during the broadcast. He has said the F word. Yeah, that got people pumped up. It did. There was, they went to like an interview where they were kind of talking up the reason why Live Aid was going on. And the interviewer was like, well, here's the,

let's get the address up on the screen. And he said, F the address, just give him the phone. Yeah, like what are people just a mail in a check? Right. Yeah, that's what they were thinking. So in like his bandmates or other, I don't know who else was there who. The other rats.

I guess maybe or else, maybe one was, uh, what was his name? Midge. Eray. He's kind of- How, from Ultravox? Yeah, he's kind of an unsung overlooked coordinator. He really helped Geldof put this together.

He might have been up there, but they all kind of look at each other like, oh my God, he just said the F word on the BBC. And that got the MTV generation going. The phone started ringing around then. Cause somebody just said the F word on TV, which if you remember back before South Park came along, that did not happen.

No, no. It did not happen. Like damn was, I don't want to say controversial, but it was like, it perked your ears up when you heard that on TV cause it was just so out of the ordinary. Oh, and an F bomb. This guy said the F word in 1985 on TV,

on live TV being broadcast around the world. It got people's attention for sure. Yeah, that's still a big deal to hear in a live TV. Like if you hear that at an award show or something, it's not shocking, but everyone goes, ooh, you're not supposed to do that. The little eight year old and he's like, oh, you're going to get in trouble.

Exactly. All right, let's take another break and we'll talk about what went on behind the scenes and where all this money went right after this. On the podcast, Hey Dude, the 90s called David Lasher and Christine Taylor, stars of the cult classic show, Hey Dude, bring you back to the days of slip dresses and choker necklaces.

We're going to use Hey Dude as our jumping off point, but we are going to unpack and dive back into the decade of the 90s. We lived it and now we're calling on all of our friends to come back and relive it. It's a podcast packed with interviews, co-stars, friends and nonstop references to the best decade ever.

Do you remember going to Blockbuster? Do you remember Nintendo 64? Do you remember getting frosted tips? Was that a cereal? No, it was hair. Do you remember AOL instant messenger and the dial up sound like poltergeist? So leave a code on your best friends beeper

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or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Lance Bass, host of the new iHeart podcast, Frosted Tips with Lance Bass. The hardest thing can be knowing who to turn to when questions arise or times get tough or you're at the end of the road. Ah, okay, I see what you're doing. Do you ever think to yourself,

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or wherever you listen to podcasts. Uh, Chuck. Yes. Let's talk about what went on behind the scenes and where all this money went. So to put together a show this big, especially in six months, there are gonna be a lot of problems.

And there were, if you talk to the artists, they all across the board had monitor issues. Oh, really? Yeah, and just couldn't, Led Zeppelin, I mean, they didn't blame it on that, but you even hear Robert Plant and the thing say, like, let's see if we can get these monitors going. And they couldn't hear themselves.

And I always had heard that until I started playing shows with my dumb old man band. Like, we can't hear ourselves. And I was like, what do you mean? Right. Like, you got these amps blasting, but it's true, you can't hear yourself on a stage. And especially an outdoor stage,

unless you've got really, really great systems and monitors, you can't hear yourself. And it's very, very disconcerting to play music. When you hear like the twang? Well, it's just weird. Like, you know that they're hearing something that you're not hearing and you're just like, I hope it's okay.

I got you. So no one could hear themselves, which is a problem. I believe that they had power issues at Wimbly where they thought it might completely go out. Like, they were having little brownouts. There were, you know, even though this is for charity, there were, you still are dealing with huge diva, pop and rock stars and their management.

Who had all by this time found out that Jerry wasn't there. So what's the point of going on stage? Well, I mean, they were, you know, there were still behind the scenes like ego battles and like, you can't go on after this act. My guy won't go on after this person or, you know, trying to get more time than 20 minutes.

Well, so much so that Billy Joel actually did not go on because he, his manager was like, they want you to do piano. And believe me, these other guys ain't playing piano. You're gonna look puny compared to his other sets. And he went, do you mean piano man, the song? And they went, no, they want you to play the piano, which is-

Comma man. Oh, that was so great and dumb. And he was like, you mean the instrument that made me famous that I wrote a song about that I play on 99% of my songs? They want me to do that? And he went, yeah. And he went, I'm not doing it.

No way. Billy Joel didn't play piano for nobody. He's like, I'll just get my telecaster and do matter of trust three times. That's very- That's a good song. That's a deep Billy Joel joke. Is it?

No, not the deepest, but that's the one where he plays guitar on stage. Oh, okay. It's kind of like the only song that he plays guitar on. Do you know he went and played a couple of dates in the Soviet Union and ended up helping to thaw relations between the US and the USSR? Yeah.

Almost single-handedly? Yeah. He also threw a tantrum on stage the first night because it was a bunch of government muckety mucks just standing in the front row staring at him. The military. Oh, was it? The government muckety mucks

and he was like, get the real fans out here. Right. So he like pushed his piano over and then doesn't miss a beat. Like keeps singing and the band keeps playing even though they're probably terrified that they're going to be putting a Soviet gulag forever. I will still go see him every single time. Sure.

I have a chance. But anyway, Billy Joel didn't play live aid as the point. No, he didn't. And he wasn't the only one. Yeah. Van Halen turned it down. Diana Ross, Liza Manelli, boy. I don't know why they asked her.

Well, I don't know. Liza? I mean, that's not, I'm not knocking her, but I don't know, it just doesn't seem like a fit. It doesn't, you're right. It's like between Sabbath and Led Zeppelin, they're going to try Liza Manelli out there. Forget your troubles.

Come on, get happy. Yoko Ono, Cindy Lauper, Talking Heads, Stevie Wonder, ACDC and Springsteen who still really, really regrets not doing live aid. Not just him. A lot of them do. Frankie goes to Hollywood, turned it down. Yeah.

And really that was their manager who was like, you don't want to do this. It's going to be like a disaster. And the band was like, afterward. They said it was the worst management decision in the history of Frankie, said the lead singer. Really? Yeah.

They were really upset that they didn't do it. Springsteen said, I really wish I was just throwing the guitar in the back seat and driven on down. That's what he said he'd wish he'd done. Driven on down the Thunder Road. Yeah. Yeah, I mean he, yeah, Springsteen should have done it. I think he knows that.

There was a lot of regret among people who didn't. Some people were like, I'm just absolutely not doing it. Michael Jackson was, it says here that he was in the studio but I read that he didn't sign on in protest because there weren't any African acts on the bill. Oh, interesting. Or enough African acts on the bill for his taste. Huh.

And then Huey Lewis was another one. Yeah, that was a big one that turned out to, and that'll be a good segue to what happened to the money because Huey Lewis is one of the few artists who came out just a few weeks before and publicly said like, where's this money going? And is this really, really helping to fight famine? Cause that's what's important to the news, my friend.

I was really surprised. I didn't realize that Huey Lewis was that woke. Yeah. And that's a very good point, like. Can I say woke? Okay. Jerry Lovenay. He's the one to verify with Jerry.

That was the big question to Huey Lewis and he's like, I'm not going out there and signing up for this. Cause I don't really know the, he was slightly cynical, but rightfully so, I think. Yeah. He had been in USA for African and was like, I'm not convinced that that money by this time,

you know, tens of millions of dollars is actually making it to the famine victims. And everybody was like, what famine victims? He's like, don't you remember? That's the whole reason we're doing this. And Geldof, I don't want to make it sound like Geldof ever lost focus. Like that is why he did this.

And he proved it during the show when he stomped on stage. He's like, give me your money. These people are dying now. And he's still very adamant and defensive about the funds Geldof is. But Huey Lewis was the first one to publicly say, I'm not certain that these famine victims

are actually getting this money. And we talked about this. We did an episode on famine and droughts. And I believe it was the famine one that we talked about it in. But six months after live aid was finished and complete and just made like $150 million, I believe. Something like that, yeah.

Worth more than 300 million a day. This concert, one day concert raised nearly $300 million for victims of famine in Africa in a little country called Ethiopia that most people hadn't heard of. And Spin Magazine sent a reporter there and said, go find out what happened to that money. And Spin Magazine's reporter came back and was like,

I don't know if you guys wanna hear what happened to that money. Because it turns out that Ethiopia was in the midst of a civil war that was being reported on even less than the famine. And it turns out that the government in Ethiopia was actually largely causing the famine or at least exacerbating the worst of it.

Yeah, so there was the dirge, is that what it was called? Which means council or committee. They were the military junta. Yeah, the dirge regime. And they, after Holly Salassie died in 1975, they took control as this military group. Well, they may have actually strangled them to death. Well, it says in the article, Suspicious Death.

So I think that's fair to say. Okay. But there were basically, there are various stories depending on who you wanna believe. Bob Geldof still says that most of this money went there. But there are other reports that it was being intercepted, aid was being intercepted. And they were funding their civil war

and that they were making the famine worse by dropping napalm on croplands this whole time. Cutting off supply lines to the north. And the north, there was a civil war going on because the north used to be a country called Eritrea. And then in World War II, Ethiopia said, you're coming with us, you're part of Ethiopia now. And there was an insurgency that eventually was successful.

I think in 1992, Eritrea became independent from Ethiopia again. But this is how that happened through the civil war. And all of a sudden, the west injects $125 million into this country that's racked by famine and civil war and civil war that's helping cause the famine. And apparently either a lot of people didn't know about this or a lot of people didn't think

we may actually be helping the civil war by injecting this money into this country and turning it over to the Ethiopian government. And still to this day, it's not entirely clear how much the Ethiopian government spent on arms and supplies to fund this war against the insurgency in the north. Yeah, I think that's one of my biggest fears

of any kind of thing like this. Of handing over these sums of money to countries that you don't know where it ends up. It's just like, it's maddening to think, because you wanna do the right thing and donate and support these causes. But if it's actually making things worse. Right, that's the thing.

It's one thing if it's not helping as much as you would like it to. It's an entirely different thing if you're actually giving money to make it easier for somebody to kill some other person, like making it worse. And that's the big question that surrounds the funds from live aid still.

And yeah, and then you think it's frustrating because the BBC in 2010 published a report kind of claiming a lot of this, the money being diverted to ill reputed places and people. Yeah, they said the opposite. They said that the rebel insurgency in Eritrea intercepted most of the money and they used it to fund their civil war.

But then they retracted a lot of this stuff because Gildoff got mad. This is only eight or nine years ago. And he was like, no, that's not true. So there's still just a lot of debate over where that money went. Right, the BBC retracted the story and published an apology too.

So they may have gotten that really wrong. I don't think they do that kind of thing just cause Bob Gildoff gets mad, you know? So- He's a B-less Irish doctor. Right, I think they got the reporting very wrong. But I also have the impression that Gildoff, whether he believes in a lot of the funds went to NGOs

on the ground, aid groups on the ground. It didn't all just go to the Ethiopian government. No, no, no. And apparently in the aid industry, they still look at this like, okay, even if some of the money didn't get to where you wanted it and it went to places you wouldn't want it to go, this still helped raise awareness

of the kind of stuff that goes on in Africa that the West was not aware of. Oh, it was, it had a huge, huge impact on how you should do these events in the future. This kicked off, farm aid and- Hands Across America, remember that? Across America, for sure. Have you seen us yet?

No, but I ran across an article that referenced that and I was like, oh, I can't wait to see that movie even more now. It's good. But yeah, I mean, it kicked off, farm aid, it kicked off like every benefit concert, global benefit concert you've ever seen since then can trace its roots back to live aid.

Including live aid. Right. Which was another Gildoff one that's, a lot of people said, call it live aid too and you'll get a lot more attractions. Yeah, but that wasn't to raise money, that was just to raise awareness for the live aid conference.

The G8. Yeah, what'd I say, the live aid conference? The G8 summit. But think about it, Gildoff wasn't trying to raise money anymore. He was trying to raise awareness and I wonder if that was because he either became convinced that that money did go to sources that he didn't want it to

or if he was just like, I'm tired of arguing about it, I'm not gonna go through this again. But as a result of that, the 18 poorest nations in the world had their debts canceled by the eight richest nations in the world. And I think the aid to Africa was like doubled over the previous G8 summit.

Yeah, and it, you know, previous to 1985, you didn't, I mean, you had like George Harrison doing the concert for Bangladesh, which was kind of one of the first high profile things like that. But you didn't see a ton of big rock stars out, you know, championing causes. And I think it really inspired a generation of young people

and of the pop and rock celebrities of that age too, to like, maybe do something beneficial with their riches in their life, for sure. Left the cocaine for a couple of days and go do something with your life, you rocker. Yeah, you can get back on the cocaine in a week. Sure, just put it off to the side. Yeah, so I mean.

Just put an upside down magazine over it and come back to it later. It was a monumental event and one that I have a lot of fondness for still. Big deal. That's great. I don't remember any of it. I remember watching it on MTV

and my big sisters were there, but I don't remember. I have no real memories. I was pretty stupid, I guess. Yeah, you were nine. I was almost nine, two days shy of being nine. Yeah, I mean, what is that, third grade? I was probably out playing with like,

he-man stuff most of the time. Exactly, trying to find cigarette butts on the ground. Not yet, just a few years later though. That's right. If you want to know more about Live Aid, I think Chuck and I, and probably Jerry, would strongly advise you to just go onto YouTube and spend a little time looking at concert footage from it.

Yeah, or send in your special Live Aid memories. Oh, that's a good one too. Yeah, I like being in London and not knowing it was going on. Right. I love that one. And since we said that, since we may find Jerry's terrible Live Aid story,

it's time for Listener May. Hey guys, listening to your episode on rape kits, my heart sank when you apologized for being two dudes educating people about the options one might have after being raped or sexually assaulted. It sounded as if you thought that men in general are not fit to do this, but I don't think it's true. I'm a doctor, guys, who works with men and women

that experience sexual violence. And I imagine that male victims would find an apology of this kind unnecessary at best, as would the male therapists who are doing great work and you can serve as much needed therapeutically invaluable counter examples after someone has had bad experiences with men. I also don't think your initial disclaimer

that this would be a serious episode without any jokes was warranted. And I'm glad the episode didn't turn out that way. If anything, your good-natured humor brought some much needed warmth to the discussion. We are all still trying to figure out how to talk about these topics. And I would like to encourage you to stand by your efforts,

shining a light on a difficult topic for the benefit of your listeners. Thank you guys, keep it up. That is from Hano. Hano. Mm-hmm, H-A-N-N-O. Thanks a lot, Hano. It's a great name.

Yeah, and if I'm not mistaken, it said Hano was in Hanover, Germany. No. Yeah. Really? Uh-huh. I wonder if they like the town so much, they just said call me Hano from now on, everybody.

Maybe. I love this town. It's like me, I'm from Chucktown. You're Addle. What? ATL. Oh, gotcha. Yeah, Chucktown, I guess, makes more sense,

if either one does. Well, thanks a lot, Hano. We appreciate that. We will try to take your advice to heart because it is pretty good advice. And if you want to get in touch with us like Hano did, you can go on to StuffYouShouldKnow.com and find our social links.

You can also send us an email to StuffPodcast.iHeartRadio.com. Stuff You Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio's How Stuff Works. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app. Apple podcasts are wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

Listen to Hey Dude, the 90s called on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Lance Bass, host of the new iHeart podcast, Frosted Tips with Lance Bass. Do you ever think to yourself, what advice would Lance Bass and my favorite boy bands give me in this situation?

If you do, you've come to the right place because I'm here to help. And a different hot, sexy teen crush boy bander each week to guide you through life. Tell everybody, yeah, everybody about my new podcast and make sure to listen so we'll never, ever have to say bye, bye, bye. Listen to Frosted Tips with Lance Bass

on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.