Real-Time Thoughts On Live Aid (The Actual Show, Part Fucking Two)

Our Father, who art in Heaven, better fucking stay up there or I’m gonna split His lip. POW! ZOOM! Right to the moon, which, of course, He created on the third or fourth day in His magnificence. I do not deserve to to be forced to watch Live Aid two nights in a row, and yet I suffer in silence. No! Not silence! I suffer during this bullshit:

You don’t have to watch that. You know how the Love Theme from Footloose goes. Sunday shoes are involved.

FASHION FACT: Kenny has Willi Wear on. Younger Enthusiasts, go ask your parents what Willi Wear was.

I have a Ric Ocasek story. It’s not much of a story, honestly, but I’m gonna tell it and you’re gonna read it and we’re all trapped here in Hell.

SO: I went to Emerson College, which is in Boston. “In Boston” is a bit of an understatement: Emerson’s buildings are all directly surrounding the Public Gardens and the Common. It’s as “in Boston” as you can get without being racist inside a Dunkin Donuts. I lived at the other end of the Back Bay, and so on the days I made it to class I would have my choice of streets to walk. I could take Boylston, where all the business people did business things, or Newbury Street, where all the punkers sat around hassling tourists, or Marlboro, which was small and shady, or Beacon Street, which was boring.

But I liked Commonwealth. It was built to resemble grand Parisian boulevards, and there were no shops or restaurants at all: just brownstones made of brick and money, and in the middle of the avenue was a great grassy mall that stretched the whole way. You could flaneur quite nicely on Commonwealth, and so I would, admiring the three-and-four-story row houses. Most had been long ago broken into apartments, but some were still family homes, and one of them–apparently–belonged to Ric Ocasek and his wife Paulina Porizkova.

This is them:

Should’ve learned to play that guitar, huh? Should’ve learned to play those drums.

Anyway, I’m walking to school, must have been around eleven in the morning, and I see what appears to be Keith Richards’ ghost sitting on a stoop. Ratcheted mess of dyed-black hair, 3% body fat, barefeet. Drinking his coffee. Wearing–and I am not making this up, Enthusiasts–a leopard-skin silk robe.

It was unsettling, like seeing a clown in a non-circus environment. He was a man out of time. The sight was not, Enthusiasts, just what I needed. But did I give him the rockyroll fingers and shout “CARS RULE” at him? Fuck, yeah, I did.

Mr Ocasek thanked me with a slight raise of his mug, and I bothered him no further.

Told you it wasn’t much of a story.

…

Ah, Christ. Not him.

A lot of you enjoy Neil Young; I won’t judge you for being wrong. The best thing he ever did was provide Joaquin Phoenix with a look for Inherent Vice. His lyrics are childish, his voice sounds like a adolescent musk ox with his balls caught in a snare, and model trains are for wieners. Fuck him and his oil-burning car and PONO, and for being the least professional person in Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young. Do you know how unprofessional you need to be to be the asshole in that group? It’s like being the most Korean member of BTS: there’s nothing but competition.

Shit, now he’s singing Helpless, Helpless, Helpless. I feel helpless, helpless, helpless. SOMEONE COME TO MY HOUSE AND TURN OFF NEIL YOUNG! HELP ME!

You know what would have been fun? If they had rotoscoped a big chunk of cocaine into his nostril for this performance. Just to even out the universe.

Maybe so many of his friends overdosed because they wanted to get away from him. Is that a possibility? I would examine it as a possibility.

Oh, and fuck Crazy Horse, too. “We’re not particularly good at playing our instruments” is not a good advertisement for a band.

I’m skipping his last song and you can’t stop me. The Constitution explicitly says that I can skip Neil Young. Article II, I think.

BULLET POINTS!

• Okay, I think I remember The Power Station.
• It was the two Taylors from Duran Duran on guitar and bass, Tony Thompson from Chic on drums…
• …but I thought Robert Palmer sang.
• I got no idea who this undernourished ghoul is.
• I shouldn’t have to do research for this shit.
• People I went to high school with are doctors.
• One girl now sells dildos shaped like your dog.
• You bring the dog in, and they scan it, and then they 3D print a dildo.
• Man’s best friend, women’s best friend, whatever.
• Folks love their dogs.
• Me?
• I’m looking up the roster of a rightly-forgotten 80’s band.
• …
• Michael Des Barres?
• Ohhhh, yeeeeeah.
• I see it now.
• I like his show on SiriusXM.
• And he was great in Sugar Town.
• If you haven’t seen Sugar Town, DO.
• It’s about the music industry in Los Angeles, and he plays a rocker who won’t grow up.
• There’s a great bit with him and Beverly D’Angelo–the hot mom from the Vacation films–where he has to sleep with her to get financing for his next record.
• Except he doesn’t want to because he thinks she’s too old.
• (She is his age.)
• But you know how show biz goes, and he closes his eyes and gets it on.
• Afterwards, they’re laying there in bed and he’s sunk into the mattress with wide eyes, muttering and purring to himself.
• And Bev is smoking a cigarette and smirking and she goes,
• “Never been fucked by a grown woman before, huh?”
• It’s a great flick.

There were three Thompson Twins: a white guy with enormous hair, a black guy with moderately-sized hair, and a white lady whose hair was as large as the similarly-hued guy’s. That is the most interesting fact about the Thompson Twins.

FUN FACT: all three were eaten by tigers in non-related incidents. Billion-to-one shot.

During the clip I posted, Steve Stevens from Billy Idol’s band, Nile Rodgers from Chic, and Madonna from Detroit come out to join them, and it says poor things about your band when your guests are that much more talented and charismatic than you. Madonna is singing backup for some reason; unfortunately, someone turned on her mic.

Oy. This is getting dire, but I can maintain. I can handle anything except a bland, chinless racist.

FUCK. Meet me in the Bullet Points

• Look how carefully Eric’s coiffed.
• The stylist really took her time.
• Not a barber.
• Can’t get that kind of cut from a barber.
• Gotta go to a styyyyyyyyyylist.
• Hey!
• Duck Dunn!
• No!
• Phil Collins!
• At least he’s just behind the drums.
• He can’t do much damage back there, right?
• (No one ask Led Zeppelin that question.)
• It should be noted that Eric “The First Guitar God” Clapton is just playing barre chords.
• The guy next to him is handling all the leads.
• Oh, now he’s soloing.
• Ugh, he tucks his chin-stump in when he solos, and he looks like a mongoose staring up at the stars.
• Omar Little stole less from black people than Eric Clapton did.
• Should’ve been you out that window, jackass.
• You and your unseemly beard.
• So well-trimmed.
• Such a clean cut-line across the neck.
• Combined with your flowing linen shirt, it really shows off your gold necklace.
• THE ONLY BRITISH MALE ALLOWED TO WEAR JEWELRY IS ALAN MOORE.
• That’s the law now.
• I wrote in all-caps, so it’s the law.
• That’s also in the Constitution.
• Man, you guys are learning a lot about American governance tonight.
• Thank me.
• Ungrateful fucks.
• I watch Eric Clapton so you don’t have to.
• I’m kinda like a Secret Service guy taking a bullet for the president.
• You think any of ’em would take a bullet for Basketball Head?
• Gotta figure the Secret Service is full of aggro fuckheads, right?
• It’s law enforcement.
• I bet half of ’em DREAM about taking a face full of buckshot for Donny.
• …
• What was I talking about?
• Oh, right: Clapton.
• Third-best guitarist in the Yardbirds.
• Second-best in Derek & the Dominos.
• He pretty much had to go solo.
• Ace Frehley is a better guitar-player than Eric Clapton.
• I said it.
• What are you gonna do about it?
• Oofah, it’s Layla.
• Yeah, yeah, yeah: the piano bit at the end.
• November Rain’s is better.
• I SAID THAT, TOO.
• Well, at least he didn’t mention the how the wogs were stealing the nation again.
• Sometimes, he does that onstage.
• Eric Clapton’ll share a stage with negros, but not a postal code.
• He loves everything black people have ever created.
• Except when they create more black people.
• Not a fan.
• God, I’m gonna be a dick on Twitter when he dies.
• FUUUUUUUUUUUUCK.

God damn you, Phil Collins!

“No. Not Phil Collins. I’m Phil Collen.”

Oh?

“From Def Leppard.”

Not much of an upgrade. But still way more acceptable than the hobbit singing Against All Odds for THE SECOND FUCKING TIME.

“You don’t need that number once.”

I agree, Phil Collen. And now he’s doing In The Air Tonight.

“Full band?”

Just Phil, a piano, and his talent.

“So…just Phil and a piano?”

Nicely done.

“Thanks. Seriously: just him on piano? No drums?”

Nope. The crowd sings the part.

“That honestly angers me.”

Me, too! We’re twins!

“We are not.”

Can I ask you a question, Phil Collen?

“Is it about my laughably obvious steroid abuse?”

Yes.

“You may not.”

Okay.

Oh, lordy.

Led Zeppelin’s Live Aid “reunion” is widely acknowledged as one of the worst performances in the history of rockyroll. I’ve written about it before, and I won’t repeat myself. Go read my brilliance.

Stills is dressed as Commodore Cocaine, Nash is wearing baggy–BAGGY–leather pants, Crosby is literally–LITERALLY!–out on bail, and Young is Neil Young.

I hate everything about everyone.

Duran Duran was…

Duran Duran is due for…

…

I have nothing to say about Duran Duran. They were like a boy band, but they played their own instruments. Lotta clothes. Lotta makeup. Hair stuff. Hungry Like The Wolf is a classic. Union Of The Snake and The Reflex are the exact same song.

Uhh…

Got nothing.

Jesus, now a guy’s paying saxophone. Say what you will about the 21st century, but there are far fewer sax solos in songs than there used to be, and I am good with that.

I do recall that Duran Duran were a “faggy” band. They were “faggy” because girls liked them. That was the kind of thinking that passed for logic in the 80’s.

Every Duran Duran has coke bloat; all their faces look like sweaty catcher’s mitts.

DD was almost done with by 1985: they’re in full-on Late-Career Live Formation, with two extra keyboardists and percussionists and black-up singers. There’s 19 fucking people on the stage. Full-on LCLF.

Patti LaBelle! Does she deserve that exclamation point? I dunno. I might have just been excited to see a black person who wasn’t stuck behind some congas while white fuckers sang their little white fucker songs.

Oh, shit, she’s killing it. TAKE WHAT’S YOURS, PATTI LABELLE.

Oh, damn, she’s singing Imagine. EVERYONE STOP SINGING THIS SONG BECAUSE I FUCKING HATE IT. Imagine is treacly horsecum, and it is not improved by being churched up.

Like I said yesterday, Live Aid was heavily criticized for featuring so few black acts. There was Patti, Billy Ocean (one song) Ashford & Simpson, the Four Tops (two songs) Kool and his Gang, and Run DMC (two songs). That’s it. Hall & Oates brought out Eddie Kendricks and David Ruffin, and George Thorogood brought out Bo Diddley and Albert Collins, but as far as booked acts go: just those six, and none of ’em were superstars.  Oh, and they were all on the American bill. Only performer darker than a spotted dick in London was Sade. (Who was actually African! Sure, she moved to the Cotswalds when she was four, and was from Nigeria, which is 3,000 miles away from Ethiopia, but still: African! She should count twice!)

FUN FACT: Sade studied art at St. Martin’s College. Her classmates all said she had a thirst for knowledge.

Oh, it is MORE than enough of Patti LaBelle and her oversinging. She sounds like Maya Rudolph doing the National Anthem.

Love me some Maya Rudolph. That woman can do anything.

First, you’re gonna need a close-up of that glory:

And the other one:

Oh, sweet sweaty Jesus, the saxophonist is wearing a sharkskin suit and saxing all over the place. His shoes are pointy.

BLUE-EYED FACT: The best part of the song Maneater is the noise Hall makes a little after 4:00. He makes this noise on the record, too. The best I can describe it is: Ooh-bidda-swa-OOOH-ooh-uh-ooh.

The Four Tops, and now The Temptations. Nothing ever beat Motown. Name a greater body of work. Picasso couldn’t match it. Those songs, and those singers, and that band? No one comes close.  It goes without saying that everyone but Berry Gordy got fucked to create that body of work. Both David Ruffin and Eddie Kendricks would be dead within a few years of this performance.

Y’know what audiences love?

That bullshit right there. The old tricks become old because they work. Crowds lose their minds for this move. The Dead should’ve tried this one. (You remember the Dead. It’s a site about the Grateful Dead.) Everyone would turn the wrong way at once and step on each others’ feet. Billy would start throwing punches. Maybe it’s best they stuck with what they knew: standing relatively motionless while staring into space, and smoking.

London had a Beatle, so Philly gets a Stone. Not the Stones. One Stone.

Mick and Keith spent a goodly portion of the 80’s not speaking with one another. This did not prevent the Rolling Stones from issuing two albums during the estrangement. (It should be noted that the records are absolutely terrible, but they were product that kept the band in the public’s eye until everyone could get their shit together and tour.)

I will take this opportunity to re-post the classic letter that the journalist Bill Wyman received from Mick Jagger explaining the period.

Returning to the theme of professionalism, though: Mick Jagger is a fucking professional. He must have known these solo tunes weren’t up to snuff. The man’s been accused of damn near everything, but never of being unobservant. Doesn’t matter: Mick’s giving the crowd the Full Mick. He does the Strut, and the Bandyleg, and he waves his arms just like you expect he will, and now he does the Bound-In-Place, up and down, and combining that with Coquettish Shoulders.

Point, point, point. Mick points a lot.

Now he sprints out and back from the extreme sides of the stage, and now he’s on a mini-cherry picker that no one else has been allowed to use.

Mick Jagger was archaeologically old in 1985. There had been, it seemed, no existence without his leering yawp in it. “Life” could be defined as “something that includes Mick Jagger.” He had never not been. He weathered psychedelia, and beat off the punkers, and was outlasting the new wavists. Mick Jagger was surely the oldest man in the world.

He was 38.

Even Anna Mae Bullock can’t save this dreck. Mick originally sang it with Michael Jackson and it was no more listenable then. However, Tina Turner has not molested a bunch of little boys, so I prefer this version.

Mick has removed his blouse, and jumped down into the pit to steal back the traffic-yellow jacket he had thrown there, and when he returns to the stage he is now wearing skintight leggings.

And then he and Tina both leave the stage before the song ends and it’s all very confusing and slapdash.

The King of the Moon is crowned. All hail Bobalith. The Boomers are ascendant. Peter Coyote is now a god. Children of the 80’s, we’re here to eat your futures.

Let’s go through the Of Courses:

OF COURSE Dylan invited Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood to join him onstage, like, an hour before they went on.

OF COURSE the three of them are coked out of their minds.

OF COURSE there has been no rehearsal whatsoever.

OF COURSE the sound is terrible, because none of them made it to soundcheck.

OF COURSE Dylan’s guitar breaks and Ronnie gives his to him, leaving the Stone standing there empty-handed grinning like a schmuck for a minute.

OF COURSE the guitar someone finally brings Ronnie is totally out of tune.

That was so Bush League I can understand why Dylan joined forces with the Dead.

100,000 in attendance at JFK that day. How many people knew this song? Six? Dylan’s such an asshole.

Oh, God, it’s over.

Not quite.

No.

Yes.

NO!

YES! THE SHOW-ENDING ALL-STAR SUPER-JAM!

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Just do it.

Fine. But you can’t make me write in paragraphs like a grown-up. I’m doing the Bullet Points.

No gives a shit.

Here we go!

• Hey, Lionel!
• Why didn’t you have a set?
• Oh, here’s Harry Belafonte.
• Were they saving the black people?
• Why do the black people have to wait until the end?
• This is bullshit.
• ATTICA!
• ATTICA!
• Sheena Easton just HIJACKED the fucking mic.
• She literally elbowed two women out of the way to get it.
• AND NOW IT’S DIONNE WARWICK!
• What the fuck?
• Ooh, Simon LeBon is wearing one of those Arafat scarves.
• I didn’t know those were hip in ’85.
• LOGGINS!
• THAT MIC BELONGS TO YOU, LOGGINS!
• How does Patti LaBelle sleep with her hair like that?
• Is it a wig?
• I hope it’s a wig.
• Doesn’t look like one, though.
• She looks like a sailfish.
• Fuck me, there are children on the stage.
• Not the dying African ones.
• They did not fly starving Ethiopian kids to Philadelphia and force them to participate in a show-ending super-jam.
• “Get on the stage and sing!”
• “Can we stop at catering real quick?”
• “NO! Get up there and sing!”
• And so forth.
• Missed opportunity.
• And the shot of the American flag.
• It was never about the kids, was it?
• It was never about Africa.
• Live Aid was about winners and losers.
• And tonight thank God it’s them instead of you.
• There’s a better day ahead.
• And it’s just for you and me.

Good night, London. Good night, Philadelphia. And good night, Addis Ababa, wherever you are.