Music: Rocking the Global Village

Geldof and Co-Organizer Bill Graham took considerable heat when it was calculated that there were only three black acts in the 24 star acts originally announced for Philadelphia. Geldof claimed that he and Graham had combed the charts and invited every currently popular black entertainer. Michael Jackson, Diana Ross, Prince and Stevie Wonder were among those who couldn't make it, but no one, for example, asked Philip Bailey. One kinetic rap group, Run-D.M.C., was told that the artists' roster had "no more room." "We were bitter, but we weren't going to beg," says Run-D.M.C. Representative Bill Adler. "Then we heard people were being added, and that made us pissed off." After some scrambling by the organizers, Patti LaBelle, Teddy Pendergrass, the Four Tops and Ashford and Simpson were invited. Some space was cleared for Run-D.M.C. too.

"I asked the biggest because the biggest will draw the most money," insisted a rankled Geldof. "It's pragmatics. Would a racist go to all this trouble to keep these people alive? People who just happen to be black? And, by the way, the fact they are black is incidental. They could be luminous orange for all I care." Ken Kragen, one of the organizers of USA for Africa, said flatly, "There is no truth that Bob or Graham ignored or didn't want black entertainers. I should know. Bob called me enough about it." "I wish the folks busy gossiping about all this backstage foolishness would concentrate on what Live Aid is really all about--helping people," comments LaBelle. "We won't get into a pissing contest with anybody at this point," says Eddie Kendricks, formerly of the Temptations and now helping out Hall and Oates with some soulful vocalizing. "We're not concerned about who's black and who's white. Hunger knows no color."

The appearances of Lionel Richie, Ashford and Simpson with Pendergrass, and Tina Turner playing dueling mouths with Mick Jagger, had the effect not so much of restoring the equilibrium as underscoring the imbalance. The fragmented brotherhood of musicians called together on this one hot day was struggling with the weight of all kinds of social responsibility, and with the refractory objectivity of the medium that brought them an anticipated worldwide audience of 1.6 billion people, then short-circuited them on intensity. The music of Live Aid was not as great as the gesture, or the effort, but the $40 million brought in at night's end buys a little life for a lot of people. "Hunger pays a heavy price to the falling gods of speed and steel," Bob Dylan sings on his new album, and, perhaps more than anything, Live Aid was a time to get prices and priorities in order. All right, then. --By Jay Cocks. Reported by Cathy Booth/Philadelphia and Steven Holmes/London