{"id":92677,"date":"2025-02-17T01:32:27","date_gmt":"2025-02-17T01:32:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peraltafinancing.com\/american-history\/live-aid-and-farm-aid\/"},"modified":"2025-02-17T01:32:27","modified_gmt":"2025-02-17T01:32:27","slug":"live-aid-and-farm-aid","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=92677","title":{"rendered":"Live Aid and Farm Aid"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div id=\"post-body-7918829007964476863\" itemprop=\"description articleBody\">\n<p>[Forty<br \/>\nyears ago this week, the musical supergroup <a href=\"https:\/\/usaforafrica.org\/\">USA (United Support of Artists) for Africa<\/a> recorded<br \/>\ntheir single \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=s3wNuru4U0I\">We are the<br \/>\nWorld<\/a>\u201d (it would drop on March 7<sup>th<\/sup>). So this week I\u2019ll<br \/>\nAmericanStudy that effort and other examples of musical activism!]<\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\" style=\"margin-top: 12.0pt; tab-stops: 142.5pt;\"><span style=\"mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;\">On how an<br \/>\noverblown controversy at one activist concert led to a second that endures to<br \/>\nthis day.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\" style=\"margin-top: 12.0pt; tab-stops: 142.5pt;\"><span style=\"mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;\">As I mentioned<br \/>\nin yesterday\u2019s post, \u201cWe Are the World\u201d was directly inspired by the British<br \/>\nsupergroup Band Aid\u2019s late 1984 single \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=RH-xd5bPKTA\">Do They Know It\u2019s Christmas<\/a>?\u201d<br \/>\nBand Aid was the brainchild of producers <a href=\"https:\/\/www.heraldscotland.com\/opinion\/24094555.midge-ure-ultravox-singer-set-band-aid-trust-geldof\/\">Bob<br \/>\nGeldof and James \u201cMidge\u201d Ure<\/a>, and in the summer of 1985 the pair decided to<br \/>\nbuild on that starting point with a \u201cglobal jukebox\u201d known as <a href=\"https:\/\/www.history.com\/this-day-in-history\/live-aid-concert\">Live Aid<\/a>,<br \/>\ncomprising a number of concerts held around the world (but headlined by a pair<br \/>\nof star-studded shows in London and Philadelphia) on July 13<sup>th<\/sup>. Watched<br \/>\nby nearly 2 billion people around the world, the concerts raised hundreds of<br \/>\nmillions for African famine relief (ostensibly, although the destination of<br \/>\nthose funds remained controversial for many years to come). But at least one famous<br \/>\nperformer at the Philadelphia show expressed a different perspective: before he<br \/>\nlaunched into a performance of his song \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=c7KKFejS58s\">When the Ship Comes In<\/a>\u201d<br \/>\n(alongside <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=h_BW3T05CS4\">Keith Richards<br \/>\nand Ronnie Wood<\/a> of the Rolling Stones), Bob <a href=\"https:\/\/americansongwriter.com\/remember-when-bob-dylan-salvaged-a-shaky-live-aid-performance-by-suggesting-farm-aid\/\">Dylan<br \/>\nargued<\/a>, \u201cI hope that some of the money that\u2019s raised for the people in<br \/>\nAfrica, maybe they can just take a little bit of it, maybe one or two million,<br \/>\nand use it, say, to pay the mortgages on some of the farms that the farmers<br \/>\nhere owe to the banks.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\" style=\"margin-top: 12.0pt; tab-stops: 142.5pt;\"><span style=\"mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;\">Even in that<br \/>\npre-internet era, Dylan\u2019s quote went viral, and was quickly and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.usatoday.com\/story\/entertainment\/music\/2023\/09\/24\/bob-dylan-farm-aid-surprise-set-heartbreakers\/70954302007\/\">consistently<br \/>\nmisquoted<\/a> (as hyperlinked above, there\u2019s a full video of the Live Aid<br \/>\nmoment, so the exact quote is perfectly clear) as \u201cWouldn\u2019t it be great if we<br \/>\ndid something for our own farmers right here in America?\u201d The us vs. them<br \/>\nframing of that misquoted version is hugely frustrating, not only because it<br \/>\nplays into so many problematic broader narratives, but also because it goes directly<br \/>\nagainst the global solidarity exemplified by Live Aid. But if we set that false<br \/>\nframing aside, Dylan\u2019s quote can be seen as offering a far more complementary<br \/>\nthan contrasting perspective, and indeed as having set in motion conversations<br \/>\nthat led to a complementary activist concert: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.champaigncountyhistory.org\/single-post\/farm_aid\">Farm Aid<\/a>.<br \/>\nInspired by Dylan\u2019s idea, Willie Nelson, John Mellencamp, and Neil Young<br \/>\norganized that <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=f79fjaMOIiY\">September<br \/>\n1985 benefit concert<\/a>, held at Champaign, Illinois\u2019s Memorial Stadium, to<br \/>\nraise funds for family farmers in the U.S. Along with those three artists, Farm<br \/>\nAid also featured performances from Dylan (natch), Billy Joel, B.B. King,<br \/>\nLoretta Lynn, and Tom Petty among many others. Attended by a crowd of 80,000<br \/>\nthe concert raised nearly $10 million for its worthy cause.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\" style=\"margin-top: 12.0pt; tab-stops: 142.5pt;\"><span style=\"mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;\">That cause<br \/>\ndidn\u2019t evaporate when the final notes sounded, though, and neither did Farm Aid,<br \/>\nwhich has held concerts almost every Fall since 1985. The most recent, 38<sup>th<\/sup><br \/>\nFarm Aid concert, held on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=hbQvnxq3xp4&amp;list=PLNVdgfOEXnVpbe9I3kdvV8aMfjHrNOQbs\">September<br \/>\n21<sup>st<\/sup>, 2024<\/a> in Saratoga Springs, New York, still featured performances<br \/>\nby Nelson, Mellencamp, and Young, this time joined by Dave Matthews &amp; Tim<br \/>\nReynolds from the Dave Matthews Band, Mavis Staples, Nathaniel Rateliff &amp;<br \/>\nthe Night Sweats, and many others. It\u2019s easy to see benefit concerts and other<br \/>\nmusical activisms as a kind of parachuted-in moment without the staying power<br \/>\nthat is required to make a lasting difference; I don\u2019t think that\u2019s entirely fair<br \/>\nin any case (raising millions of dollars as well as collective awareness are meaningful<br \/>\neffects no matter what), but Farm Aid certainly reminds us that many of these<br \/>\nefforts endure long after the initial concert, and can become an ongoing element<br \/>\nof vital collective activism. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\" style=\"margin-top: 12.0pt; tab-stops: 142.5pt;\"><span style=\"mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;\">Next<br \/>\nmusical activism tomorrow,<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\" style=\"margin-top: 12.0pt; tab-stops: 142.5pt;\"><span style=\"mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;\">Ben<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\" style=\"margin-top: 12.0pt; tab-stops: 142.5pt;\"><span style=\"mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;\">PS. What<br \/>\ndo you think? Activisms you\u2019d highlight?<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>[Forty years ago this week, the musical supergroup USA (United Support of Artists) for Africa recorded their single \u201cWe are the World\u201d (it would drop on March 7th). So this week I\u2019ll AmericanStudy that effort and other examples of musical activism!] On how an overblown controversy at one activist concert led to a second that [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12032],"tags":[9821,6021,4903],"dealstore":[],"offerexpiration":[],"class_list":["post-92677","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-american-history","tag-aid","tag-farm","tag-live"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Live Aid and Farm Aid - Som2ny Network<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=92677\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Live Aid and Farm Aid - Som2ny Network\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"[Forty years ago this week, the musical supergroup USA (United Support of Artists) for Africa recorded their single \u201cWe are the World\u201d (it would drop on March 7th). 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