Good call on My Little Underground – I’m also wondering if ’85 was the first time “indie” was used as a term, either positively or negatively. It certainly helped the industry to create a sub-genre for Live Aid refuseniks, blending all the delights of the ‘independent charts’ into one instantly identifiable ‘indie’ noise (ie The Wedding Present).

The Philadelphia sets were largely used by the Wembley crowd as an excuse to queue for the toilets or order more lukewarm lager; the only one of those acts truly to connect with us were the Beach Boys, Mike Love cheerleading as ever, the Wellesian bulk of Brian immobile and unknowing behind his modest keyboard.

Nearly everyone towards the front was there for U2, and theirs was by far the day’s best performance; some corny audience bits of business which both David Cassidy and David Essex had deployed a decade earlier, perhaps, but somehow it worked, and Bono and the girl became that pastel-coloured couple in the Yellow Submarine cartoon, waltzing forever. Queen were immaculate, Mercury the supreme master of timing and dealing with an audience – but what did their set have to do with the starving Ethiopians, and were we the only ones present who felt more than somewhat nauseous at the mass sieg-heiling in “Radio Ga Ga”?

Perhaps the noblest performance that Saturday was Bowie’s; besuited, disciplined, ready to bend his art to make it relevant to the issue at hand (“We can be heroes just for one day”) and sufficiently generous to cut his set short to allow the screening of the CBC “Drive” montage. The silence thereafter lasted for some seconds, and neither Dire Straits nor Elton nor McCartney and his malfunctioning mike nor even the Who could banish the scar that left.

That is, if it left any real scars; for what seemed to matter in Live Aid was that suddenly we were once again reminded who in pop and rock mattered and who didn’t. Compare the subsequent sales of the Queen, U2, Phil Collins and Dire Straits back catalogues (or even the renewed success of “Drive,” returning to the top five less than a year after its first visit there), and the promotion to the Luvvie League of George Michael, with the sharply contrasting fates of all the Culture Clubs and Frankies and ABCs who either couldn’t or wouldn’t participate, or weren’t even asked. Meanwhile, what was left of “indie” music was forced to retrench into a defensive tugboat of resistance – think of the Mary Chain’s “My Little Underground” or C86 passim.

With their massacre of “Dancing In The Street,” Bowie and Jagger seemed to relish rubbing it in. Originally conceived as a video interlude for Live Aid and not intended for single release, public demand in those pre-YouTube days quickly reversed that decision. As performers old enough to have been affected by the original in 1964, their slaughter of the song is doubly unforgivable. Archie Shepp was neither wrong nor alone in detecting a subtext of black revolution in the subtly insistent rhythms of the song and in Martha Reeves’ super-confident lead vocal. Note that on the Motown original there are two sets of percussion at work; the tribal/slavery pounding on the main kit by co-writer Marvin Gaye, and the chains (freedom!) rattling and smashing half a beat behind (or ahead), wielded by Steve Reid, the future noted free jazz drummer who in his long and distinguished career has worked with just about all the major American post-Coleman improvisers – including a stint with Shepp. The message – as with the Impressions’ “We’re A Winner” – was inescapably clear.

Bowie and Jagger jettison all those inconvenient political signifiers for a straightforward glossy run through the song; its hard-faced firmly-on-the-beat ’80s drums unforgiving in their meanness, the coarseness of its seamless production clashing uncomfortably with the singers’ schoolboy pranks. It ushers in the Jools Holland era of the cause being more important than the art, the style far superseding any worthwhile content; besuited, de-androgynised, de-sexualised Proper Music which sounds expensive from five rooms away but so, so cheap whenever you attempt to get close to it.

I’m NOT saying it’s as good as the original, by any means, and the original played, if not at the time then certainly in retrospect, an important part in social change. Here’s what I said to Mike TD when it featured in Which Decade a few months ago: “a great pop song which, even if it wasn’t intended to be iconic, became so because of the social circumstances of the decade. It still staggers me how people who were among the most successful entertainers in 60s America (the Supremes hitting number one as regularly as the Beatles) were such third class citizens.”

But in the context of Live Aid, given an 80s production that does different things to the song, I still think this is a lot of fun and some people on here could lighten up!

Commercially yes but I’ve never heard anyone make the case that “Let’s Dance” is one of his best albums.

The hero-worship of the New Romantics elevated both Bowie and Ferry to superstar status but ironically neither produced much essential music afterwards.

The Stones last single (or at least last hit) before this was “Undercover of the Night”, a pretty credible stab at updating their trademark sound for the 80s – certainly a big step forward from Start Me Up’s anachronisms.

Bowie in 83 had probably the most successful year of his career.

As a one off for the Live Aid concert it’s hard to be too critical about the intention. On purely artistic grounds, they really shouldn’t have consented to its release, though perhaps they felt they would look uncharitable if they didn’t.

I don’t suppose either of them rate the recording now – it never features, as far as I am aware, on any best-ofs or anthologies.

Re 33: Yes it was necessary. They are baboons; they are presenting.

The video would have been much more effective than Just say No/’Heroin screws you up’ as anti drugs propaganda. Bowie looks inches from death (he was edging closer to Never Let Me Down which was more or less the same thing).

In any event, here’s a weird little single that I retain a fondness for.

#29 Thanks for mentioning ” Body Rock “. In an ideal world Maria Vidal would have raced past these two has-beens.

As over-the-top as this was, it did at least have the saving grace of alerting those of us too young to remember it to the original. (“I Got You, Babe” had never really gone away, at least where the AM radio hits ‘n’ memories format was concerned.) But as the final number one for two once-great performers, this was a tawdry swansong. I’m relieved to learn that they considered it a one-off for Live Aid – if it had been, it might today have a kind of kitsch charm – but why did they agree to extend its life? Charity is all well and good, but when you’re a millionaire it’s got to be better to write a fat cheque than to don a silly costume and go out shaking a bucket. If you saw someone boogyin’ up to you in those outfits, you’d be dancing around them in the street. 3.

This single was the signal.