35th Anniversary of Live Aid Concert – The Day the Music Changed the World

35-years ago it was the day when the music changed the world. Today is the 35th anniversary of the iconic Live Aid concert, held on July 13, 1985.

Here you’ll find the legendary performances in the best possible quality. All from the legendary performances of the event you could find below in a 100 minutes’ playlist. You can find all the performances from the iconic concert including the one with Dire Straits.

The entire event, including some previously unseen footage, can be watched today on Facebook and Twitter. Live Aid was a benefit concert watched by nearly 2 billion people worldwide when it was broadcast on July 13, 1985. The original event was organized by Bob Geldof and Midge Ure.

In October 1984 Bob Geldof saw a news report detailing the horrific drought and famine in Ethiopia that was threatening to indiscriminately take the lives of 30 million men, women, and children.

Determined to help these defenseless people that had no voice of their own, Bob and Midge Ure quickly teamed up and set a process in motion that led to one of the biggest fundraising initiatives ever. Watched by billions of people on 95% of TV screens across the globe, Live Aid is the greatest concert of all time.

This event was a “Global Jukebox.” It was held simultaneously at Wembley Stadium in London, the UK, attended by about 72,000 people, and John F. Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia, the US, attended by exactly 89,484 people. The concerts were seen by around 40% of the global population.

Live Aid concert continued for just over 16 hours, but the total concert’s length was much longer. 13 satellites including five Intelsat satellites, beamed the broadcast live to televisions and radios across the globe.

Dire Straits had their live performance on Live Aid concert together with Sting. They started with performing with “Money for Nothing” song featured Sting. The next song which Dire Straits performed was “Sultans of Swing.” That was a legendary performance by the band.

Short-long Story

“More than 70 of the top musical artists at the time, including Dire Straits, Elton John, RUN DMC, David Bowie, and Queen, all performed (for free) to more than 2 billion viewers. Broadcasted to 110 countries around the world for a concert called “Live Aid” in an effort to raise money for famine-stricken Ethiopia. The event raised more than $123 million & £150 million in donations. The publicity put pressure on western nations to make available enough surplus grain to end the current hunger crisis. This was a perfect example of how people, not governments make positive changes for our world. Makes you wonder though, what happened to society that stopped celebs using their star power for events like these.”