I was two weeks shy of my thirteenth birthday, and in Oregon filming Stand By Me, when Live Aid happened in 1985, and I was a little too young (and focused on making the movie) to fully appreciate it. When I was old enough to understand what I’d missed, I never thought I’d get a chance to experience the show.
Never that is, until the good kids at Rhino released Live Aid on DVD, which Anne gave me for Christmas. For the past two days, I’ve turned off Fred and let the DVD run while I work on various writing projects. I’d heard a little bit of it over the Thanksgiving weekend, when XM played it on the 80s channel, so I expected to enjoy it, but I’m a little surprised at just how much it rocks. The performances really hold up, and one of them even made an impression on Ryan and Nolan.
After listening to Paul Young perform one of my all-time favorite songs, (Come Back And Stay), I moved to the couch to watch U2 perform. In order to fully recreate the concert experience, I cranked up the Onkyo to a million, and bounced a beach ball around my living room.
Ryan walked into the room, and sat down on the couch next to me. He and Nolan have grown up with U2 the way I grew up with The Beatles, so he recognized the song right away.
“Is that U2?” He said.
I told him that it was, and while Bono continued to sing, I gave him a brief history of Live Aid.
“. . . so Bob Geldof decided to —”
“Wait. I’m sorry to interrupt, but what’s up with Bono’s boots?” He pointed to the screen, and for the first time I noticed that Bono was wearing leather pants, tucked into knee-high suede boots. They had an impressive heel.
“Uhh . . .” I began.
“And is that . . . oh my god. It is.” The color drained from his face. “He has a mullet.”
Before I could reply, Nolan walked into the room.
“Hey!” He said. “What are you watching?”
“It’s Live Aid,” I said. “They were raising money for —”
“Woah! That is a sweet mullet!” Nolan pointed at the screen and erupted into peals of laughter.
I paused the DVD, and turned to face them.
“Listen, you guys. It was 1985.”
They looked back at me, blankly.
“Oh, nice.” It’s yet another ‘I’ve-just-become-my-parents’ moment, just replace ‘it was the sixties’ with ‘it was the eighties.'”
“The mullet was the official haircut of rock and roll,” I said.
Before either of them could point out how ludicrous this statement was, even if it was true, I tried to explain: “This concert was a really important event! Not only are these all incredible bands at the height of their popularity, but you can see what happened when a bunch of people came together to make a difference in the . . . in the world . . ” I realized that they weren’t listening to me. Ryan’s face was turning red and Nolan was choking back massive giggles.
“What?” I said.
Ryan’s face cracked, and he howled with laughter as he pointed at the TV. I looked up, and saw that I’d paused the movie on a shot of Bono, his head thrown back, eyes clamped shut, microphone held high . . . and mullet in full-effect.
“I’m sorry, Wil.” Ryan said. “What were you saying?”
I laughed in spite of myself. Bono did look pretty ridiculous. “I’ll tell you another time. For now, just try to enjoy the music.”
“Oh, we can do that,” Nolan said, and made a big production of putting his hands over his eyes.
“Hey, let’s see how well your rock and roll heroes hold up in twenty years,” I said.
“As long as they don’t have mullets, I think we’ll be fine,” Ryan said.
I pressed play and we watched — well, I watched and they listened, to the rest of Sunday Bloody Sunday, followed by Bad.
“See?” I said. “That was during Unforgettable Fire, just before Joshua Tree. Those two songs they just played are the reason you have heard U2 since you were too little to know what music was.”
As the final strains of Bad echoed over an aerial shot of Wembley Stadium, they cut to footage of Phil Collins about to board the Concorde.
“Who’s that?” Nolan asked.
“That’s Phil Collins. He just finished performing in London, and now he’s going to fly to Philly to perform there too,” I said. “It was pretty cool.”
“Phil Collins?!” Ryan said, “The wussy Tarzan guy?!”
I shrugged my shoulders. “Well . . . yeah.”
“He was cool?”
“Phil Collins was . . . ” I cleared my throat. “He was an international superstar.”
Ryan looked at me, genuinely confused. “Why?”
I took a deep breath and gave the only answer I could.
“It . . . it was 1985.” I said, suddenly not that uncomfortable to take another step toward becoming my parents, and silently grateful that the kids hadn’t been in the room when I was rocking out to Adam Ant.
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i’ve been reading you for a while and i love your writing, i’m so happy for you!
Phil Collins is my #3 favorite artist of all-time, next to Elton John and Billy Joel. And I’m only 18! I feel sad that Nolan and Ryan consider him “wussy”. I hope that they soon see how amazing he is. And what’s up with your excuse of “it was 1985”? I would’ve been indignant lol!
Off subject:
Just so you know, you are insanely amazing. I know you hear it from all of you “loving adoring fans, oh Wil, I hated Wesley Crusher, but you’re so wonderful, yadda yadda yadda” but it’s true, sadly enough. I did hate Wesley Crusher. Ok…I DO hate Wesley Crusher. I’m the biggest Trekkie that I know at my college and guess what? There’s a radio personality that goes by Wes Crusher and I really had to convince myself to not call and be like, dude, couldn’t you have picked a cooler name? But then a friend sent me a link to your website, and you are now one of the most amazing celebrities that I know of. And I also now have a strong dislike for William Shatner.
So…as random as all of this is, I just thought that it might be reassuring *or frightening* to know that your fans aren’t just old people like you *hahaha, SOOO joking*, but young hipsters that use words like “gnarly” and “far out” and “indubitably”. And me, who uses words like “Q’apla” and phrases like “Don’t try to be a great man, just be a man. Let history be the judge.” *Quick, prove your Trekkiness and name the movie*
Anne is one of the luckiest women in the world and I sincerely hope that Nolan and Ryan realize just what they have.
You rock!!!
Excellent post, Wil! I remember those days well.
I loved the music and cartoons of the 80s and early 90s, even if the fashions left much to be wished for.
It’s funny, but you’d think with all the toys, cartoons and *shudder* FASHIONS coming back from that era (I work in retail…ever see the LA Gear brand? Yeah, that’s coming back, too), the music would regain some popularity.
Though, from what I understand, the next big thing is gonna be pink stuff…for both men and women. ’80s gone pink…excuse me while I try beating that image out of my head. Gyaah..
That scene with the kids will play out in my head every time I listen to U2. It is funny, heartbreaking and priceless! It reminded me of the time Billy Crystal told the story of his daughter coming to him all distressed and asking, “Daddy, is the TRUE that Paul McCartney used to belong to a band before Wings?” But the mullet gives it a nice visual twist! Sweet.
Got the DVD for christmas as well – and had very similar experiences with the kids.
The highlight of ‘OMG what were they (we all?) wearing at the time’ was seeing Madonna’s white socks, though!
Err- for what it’s worth, Sunday Bloody Sunday was on “War,” and Bad was from “The Unforgettable Fire” a year later. I would love to love the newer U2 albums as much, but I’m afraid nothing could match those two albums.
Well, count me among the fans of the “wussy Tarzan guy.” I’ve been a fan of both Phil Collins and Genesis for a long time now. If Ryan heard the drums on, well, any track from Genesis Live, but I’m thinking “Watcher of the Skies” or “The Knife” here, he might have a completely different impression of Phil. (Come to think of it, he may not even know the significance of Peter Gabriel in that lineup…) On the other hand, he may be too young yet to appreciate progressive rock.
And, of course, Phil came up with those cannon-shot drums leading into the final chorus of “In The Air Tonight.” You gotta respect that.
I remember watching Live Aid from a hotel room in Solvang, where we’d gone on a part-vacation, part-father’s business trip. It seemed to me at the time like a really cool thing. In many respects, it still is.
The sad thing is that they didn’t try to get the U.S. for the end of Bad. At least they didn’t cut away for a pointless interview about nothing.
The only real downside to the live aid DVD is that they cut out so much. I’m fairly certain that Sting/Collins and Status Quo played more songs. I know Black Sabbath did (but ozzy sounded so awful, the snip is actually a blessing).
It’s also a bit annoying that it’s not shown in the order things were played. But it’s still nice to have decent copies of the material, though I do wonder why the BBC’s video is so bad. My 20 year old VHS tapes don’t have red bands, so i don’t know why the BBC’s masters have them.
hi,madonna was also on that plane,and how about when mick ripped off tina’s skirt.
Had to post this one to Adam-Ant.net… 🙂
I have those moments often.. My 5 year old told me that the dinsaurs were still around in the 1970’s…. When I told her that I was born in 1978, and that the dinos have been gone for billions of years, she asked me if I was TWO years old then.
And then there’s the whole thing where a 16 year old told me she heard of Atari last year.
I feel so OLD!
I remember watching Live Aid when I was little… I was around 7 and I watched the whole thing with my 2 year old brother.
I hate how kids and memories can make you feel so damn old when you are supposed to feel young!!!!!
Man, this article brought back some fond memories. I remember sitting up in my room with a tape recorder against the speaker trying to record Dire Straits with Eric Clapton standing in and Peter Gabriel performing “Biko” with Simple Minds. I’m getting goosebumps just typing that.
Great show. Great memories. Thanks for the stroll down memory lane.
-davep
If memory serves, there is a guitar “duet” with Mark Knopfler and Eric Clapton… if I am right, and your kids said that THAT was uncool… well, then THEY are uncool. 🙂
Never mind that I also wore the Bono mullet for a substantial number of years.
I bought the DVD for my Dad for his birthday last week, & want to see it. I was 10 & on scout camp that w/e, & listened to whatever we could catch snippets of on the transistor radio that the folks in the next camp site had. No VCR in our house at that point either, so I’ve never really seen it…
Classic “bit” that I do recall is from (I think) the 1st concert to free Nelson Mandela, when Mark Knopfler annouced that his brother was a new Dad & couldn’t play that day, but that the last minute replacement… the best they could do at short notice, was Eric Clapton.
Have to go home again soon & watch my Dad’s copy of the DVD.
Forgive my laughing at your expense, Will, but I am glad to know that I am not the only parent out there going through this. My 7 year old stepdaughter was shocked and amazed to know that things called “records” existed before CDs, and that not all movies and TV shows I grew up with were in color. (and this poor child has no idea what a Smurf is! LOL)
Hey, I happen to like Phil Collins! Still!
Yeah, okay, he wasn’t what he used to be…but still. I will but any album he comes out with till the day he dies. Phil rocks, man.