Live 8 Performances Rock, Coverage Fails

Pop music is not going to save the world, and despite the hopes and dreams of the drug-addled 1960s, musicians are not really the people best situated to lead mankind. That said, artists do have the right and duty to prod the imagination and the conscience. Sir Bob Geldof did that 20 years ago with Live Aid, and his repeat performance as philanthropic impresario with Live 8 was astonishing. But no silver lining is without its cloud. Viacom, the owner of MTV and VH1, had the concert of a generation to cover, and their production people and Video Jockeys were obstacles to the shows.

First, as it should be, comes the music. Twenty years ago, only Run DMC carried the hip-hop flag, and while no one has ever done rap better, the presence of so many rappers illustrates the change in musical tastes in the last generation. Under-represented again was country, not because country fans don’t care, but because no real recruiting effort happened. European rockers just didn’t think to ask, but Toby Keith proved he could just about carry country by himself.

Then, there were the performances that the entire world wanted to see: Sir Paul McCartney (the world is down to its last two Beatles after all – and not even the better ones at that), the reunited Pink Floyd, Green Day’s version of “We are the Champions” played in a Berlin that had reunited since Live Aid, Madonna (who can still do what she has always done, although quite why is beyond most reason), and Nelson Mandela from Johannesburg (Prisoner #46664 is not technically a rock star, but is the closest thing politics comes to such).

But Viacom bungled the coverage of all of it. While Stevie Wonder played “Superstition” in front of 1 million people in Philadelphia, MC Lyte stood in the foreground telling the viewers at home how great it was to hear it live. It would have been nice to see it too. And since coverage started at 12 noon Eastern Daylight Time, the entire Tokyo end of things never hit the airwaves in the Western Hemisphere (so much for “we are the world”). Showing one song or so per act was nonsense, and with all the music networks Viacom owns (MTV, MTV2, VH1, VH1 Classic) every song from every stage should have and could have been broadcast. The Red Elvises and Moral Code X played in front of the Kremlin (imagine rocking Red Square 20 years ago), and it might have done the world some good to hear them. Had the Viacom bunch been in charge of the Olympics, the miserable “Up Close and Personal” segments would have run during the events making them even worse. AOL carried all of it, but fewer people have internet access than have pay TV.

Viacom did try to educate as well as entertain, and they get points under “hearts in the right place” category. Far too few people know what the G-8 is, what a summit does, and precisely how much power is concentrated in that room in Gleneagles, Scotland this week. The world tried to save Africa 20 years ago and discovered money isn’t really the problem. The political will to fix the continent is necessary as well. Live 8 might have created the basis for that political will to take shape. The finger-snapping commercials that illustrated the death of an African child every 3 seconds might have been overdone, but probably not.

In the end, Live 8 leaves two questions behind. The first is whether anyone who watched, either in person or on TV, will still be engaged on Saturday of this week-end. And the second is a bit astonishing. An estimated 3 billion people watched. That’s about half of humanity. They have asked to be led on this issue. The question is do Messrs. Blair, Bush, Berlusconi, Chirac, Putin, Martin, Schroeder, and Koizumi have the political talent to lead that many willing people? When the G-8 meet next year in Saint Petersburg (Leningrad) Russia next year, the world will have an answer.


© Copyright 2005 by The Kensington Review, J. Myhre, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent.
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