With Band Aid, Geldof and co kickstarted a bandwagon that every deserving cause with a begging bowl was keen to hitch itself to - the charity single. Rather than African famine, money this time was being raised for the families of victims of the Bradford City fire disaster that claimed the lives of 56 football fans in May of that year.There's no criticism of the ends, but the means leave rather a lot to be desired; does anyone in this world really need another version of this old Rogers and Hammerstein chestnut? Especially one sung by a 'supergroup' led by Gerry Marsden and made up of (amongst others) Keith Chegwin, Jim Diamond, Bruce Forsyth, Jess Conrad, John Conteh, Rolf Harris, Dave Lee Travis, Kiki Dee, Bernie Winters and the Nolan Sisters? Thought not.
It's a faithful and enthusiastic version by numbers, but like 'We Are The World' before it, 'You'll Never Walk Alone' begs the question as to what you do with it once you've bought and taken it home? As merely a token of a good deed done, replay value is zero and I'd suggest the vast majority were slung in the back of the cupboard to gather dust next to the Soda Syphon and Ronco Button Magic. Better by far for Marsden to have re-released his own 1963 version instead and spared us this one, though maybe I'm still pissed that it kept 'Kayleigh' off the number one spot.
I was at the Fire and what it did to people was unimaginable, these people didn’t need to do this record but in doing it raised millions of pounds for the Bradford Burns Unit and still helps people to this day, if doing this kept Kayleigh from No1 tough tits.
ReplyDeleteAnd tough tits on you that I think it's a bag of shite. But thanks for reading.
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