The unlikely tale of ‘Do They Know It’s Christmas?’: An ‘OK song that became somethin | 2018-11-23 21:07:10 (Visits: 1413 Times) |  | | photo1,The cast of Band Aid in 1984 (?Photo: Polydor)
2,Band Aid-Do They know It's christmas?
3,Band Aid-Do They know It's christmas?
Lyndsey Parker,Yahoo Music•November 23, 2018
Thirty-four years ago, on Nov. 25, 1984, new wave’s elite came together to record “Do They Know It’s Christmas?,” a now-legendary holiday benefit single for Ethiopian famine relief. Most people remember that the Boomtown Rats’ Bob Geldof, who was inspired to do the project after watching an October 1984 BBC report about the crisis in Ethiopia, was at the helm, and that the famous song was belted by superstars like Simon Le Bon, Boy George, Sting and Bono. But not everyone realizes that Band Aid would not have existed without Midge Ure of Ultravox, who co-wrote and produced the track and even played almost all of the instruments on the final recording.
But strangely, Ure doesn’t think “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” is that great a song.
“I’ve been misquoted many times as saying it’s the worst song I’ve ever written, and it’s certainly not — I’ve written much worse! — but as a song, it’s OK,” Ure tells Yahoo Entertainment with a shrug. “As a record, it’s exceptional; as a moment in time, it’s phenomenal for what it was. But as a song, meh. It’s no ‘White Christmas.’ … I still think of it as an OK song that became something much better than it actually was.”
Whether Ure’s surprisingly unenthusiastic assessment of “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” is correct, and even if the song has since been criticized for being patronizing and self-righteous, there’s no denying that it made a cultural impact at the time. Rush-released just days after it was recorded in a whirlwind all-nighter session at Trevor Horn’s SARM Studios in London (Horn donated the studio time, free of charge), the single shot straight to No. 1 in Britain and stayed there for five weeks — becoming the biggest-selling single in U.K. chart history at the time. It went on to sell 3.8. million copies in the United Kingdom alone, and 12 million worldwide.
The song has since been re-recorded by three other “Band Aids,” in 1989, 2004 and 2014 — but Ure confirmed last year that there will never be another be another remake, out of respect for two of the original recording’s participants, George Michael and Status Quo’s Rick Parfitt, who recently passed away. However, Ure confesses, “I’m not denying that every time I hear the opening bars of that [1984] song as I’m walking around the supermarket or wherever, that opening clang still sends shivers up my spine. So, as a record, it really did achieve its goals.” The original “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” eventually raised over $24 million, and inspired other well-meaning pop-music charity efforts of the ’80s, like USA for Africa’s “We Are the World” and Geldof’s global Live Aid concerts.Read on for Yahoo Entertainment’s interview with the man who was behind the mixing board for the legendary Band Aid session, for the inside scoop on Boy George’s near no-show, Duran Duran’s “shenanigans,” Bono’s big breakout moment, that unauthorized Tears for Fears sample, and more.
Yahoo Entertainment: Surely you must have realized you were doing something historical with Band Aid, right?
Midge Ure: I think there’s a power in naiveté, and there was an awful lot of naiveté in putting Band Aid together. Our goal at the time was simply to try and get a No. 1 record in the U.K., which would have raised in the region of 100,000 pounds. We couldn’t see beyond that. But I recall as I was driving home from the studio at 8 o’clock in the morning the next day [after the one-day recording session], Bob took a cassette to the BBC. I heard them on the radio playing the cassette, and I thought, “This is something special. The BBC don’t play cassettes!” And the moment the song finished, they played it again. And then they played it every hour on the hour — from a cassette — while the master tapes went straight to the factory to get pressed up. So, at that moment, I knew something odd had happened, something that had never happened before.
So, let’s talk about that recording session from the night before. How did you recruit all this A-list talent?
Well, when Bob gets a bit between his teeth, he doesn’t take no for an answer. So he wouldn’t speak to a manager or a record label or an agent — he would find the phone number for the artist and he’d speak to the artist himself, which was brilliant. He just cut through the red tape. While I was in the studio twiddling knobs and layering up keyboards and writing drum parts, he was on my telephone, running up huge telephone bills, because he was calling these guys all around the world! Duran Duran were on tour, Spandau Ballet were on tour, and Sting’s always on tour, so it was really difficult to nail them down. But he spoke to them directly — which in itself is exceptionally dangerous, simply because if you don’t speak to a manager, if you speak directly to an artist, there’s a very good chance that the artist is not going to write anything down. He’ll just go, “Yeah, yeah, I’ll be there!” — and then have no idea what it was he just agreed to do. Artists are a little bit flaky. So there was a moment when Bob and I were standing outside SARM Studios in London with camera lenses stuck in our noses, just a sea of media, and we hadn’t a clue who was going to show up. Nobody had confirmed. We’d given the date and given them the time, and kind of just hoped that they’d remember. But they all turned up! I don’t think there was one person who said they’d be there who wasn’t.
A Christmas miracle! But I heard Boy George almost didn’t make it.
George was the closest person to missing it. He was still in New York. He forgot all about it. He was sleeping in his hotel room in New York and Bob called him and said, “Where are you, you’re meant to be here!” And George said, “Oh, is it today? Who else is there?” And Bob said, “Every f***er in music is here but you. Get up and get on a plane and get here!” And George did. He turned up at 7 or 8 o’clock at night, and walked straight in and sang his vocal brilliantly.
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