Do They Know It's Christmas?

Do They Know It's Christmas? is a song written and recorded in 1984 by Bob Geldof and Midge Ure in reaction to a series of reports that Michael Buerk made for BBC television news programmes, which highlighted the famine in Ethiopia that was taking place at the time.

Midge Ure... This was a time before mobile phones, or the internet, and to reach America you had to use Telex. Bob came to my studio and rang all of our friends and contemporaries. He ran up a massive phone bill while I was doing all the work!

Bob Geldof... I then rang Sting and he said, yeah, count me in, and then [Simon] Le Bon, he just immediately said tell me the date and we'll clear the diary. The same day I was passing by this antique shop and who is standing in there but Gary Kemp, just about to go off on tour to Japan. He said he was mad for it as well and to wait 10 days till they [Spandau Ballet] got back in the country... suddenly it hit me. I thought, 'Christ, we have got the real top boys here', all the big names in pop are suddenly ready and willing to do this... I knew then that we were off, and I just decided to go for all the rest of the faces and started to ring everyone up, asking them to do it.

It was first recorded in a single day on 25 November 1984 by Band Aid, a supergroup put together by Geldof and Ure and consisting mainly of the biggest British and Irish musical acts at the time.

Bob Geldof... It was lucky in a way, because I had already written this song, which I had provisionally called It's My World, and I knew it would be suitable if I just changed the words a bit and called it Do They Know It's Christmas? Midge, reliable as ever, sent down this tune which is the sort of Christmassy bit at the end and we married the two together.

Midge Ure... It was crazy. Everyone wanted to know what was going on, so there was this huge sea of reporters and photographers. And Bob and me. And nobody else.

Trevor Horn offered the use of Sarm West Studios in Notting Hill in west London free of charge for twenty-four hours on Sunday 25 November. Horn would later remix and co-produce the 12" version of the single, as well as remixing the single for its 1985 re-release.

Geldof and Ure arrived at Sarm West at around 8 am on Sunday 25 November with the media in attendance outside. With recording scheduled to begin at 10:30 am the artists began arriving. Geldof had arranged for the UK newspaper The Daily Mirror to have exclusive access inside the studio, and ensured that a 'team photo' was taken by the newspaper's photographer Brian Aris before any recording got under way, knowing that it would be ready in time to appear in the following day's edition of the newspaper and help publicise the record. The photograph also appeared on the back cover of the single.

Tony Hadley (Spandau Ballet)... The night before we were in Germany on the piss with Duran, having a real good drink. By the morning, we were all pretty rough. We didn’t look great. I remember arriving back at Heathrow and someone said, “There’s all the press, there’s cameras out there, there’s about 400 screaming fans.” All of a sudden we’re all in the bathroom trying to make ourselves look presentable – you know, Nick Rhodes putting stacks of makeup on. I think we all put a bit of makeup on that day, actually.

Geldof had been keen to include Culture Club's Boy George on the single, at the time one of the biggest music stars in the world, and had called him in New York the day before the recording to insist that George turn up. Having only gone to bed a few hours before, a sleepy George was woken up by Geldof insisting that he get onto a Concorde transatlantic flight later that morning. However, George went back to sleep following the phone call, and only made it onto the last Concorde flight of the day later that afternoon.

Midge Ure... We had to have him. So Bob woke him up in New York. George said, “Who’s there?” Bob said, “Every fucker but you. Get your ass on Concorde.” And he did – at his own expense, I might add.

George eventually arrived at Sarm West at 6 pm and went immediately into the recording booth to deliver his lines, the last solo artist of the day.

Phil Collins arrived with his entire drum kit to record a live drum track on top of the already programmed drum machine. He set up the kit and then waited patiently until early evening until after all the vocals had been recorded.

Sting... The lyrics are bleak, but essentially so, and a welcome change from the bromides of mistletoe and the saccharine Christmas fare that is usually served up.

A number of people were out of the country at the time of the recording session and those who were unable to appear instead sent recorded messages of support that appeared on the single's B-side, including David Bowie and Paul McCartney.

Radio 1 began to play the song every hour – normally an A-list single got seven or eight plays per day. The song had advance orders of 250,000 within a week of its recording and orders from record dealers had topped one million by 8 December. In order to meet demand, Phonogram had all five of their European factories put to work pressing the single.

The single was released in the UK on 3rd December 1984. It entered the UK Singles Chart the following week at number one, outselling all the other records in the chart put together, with the 7" single alone selling 200,000 copies in the first two days of release. The record became the fastest selling single in UK chart history, selling a million copies in the first week alone and passing three million sales on the last day of 1984.

It stayed at No.1 for five weeks, becoming the Christmas number one of 1984 and raising £8 million within twelve months of release for the victims of the Ethiopian famine. The original 1984 version of Do They Know It's Christmas? has sold 3.8 million copies in the UK to date.

Midge Ure... People sometimes ask if I think it changed anything; after all, people are still starving.  It did not ‘fix’ it, but then that is why we called it Band Aid; it could not cure the problem but it could fix it for a while.

It also changed the attitude of young people towards charity. All of a sudden it was cool to be charitable, whereas before it had been seen as something done by your grandparents or the WI.

The original recording session featured:
Chris Cross + Midge Ure (Ultravox)
Pete Briquette, Johnny Fingers, Simon Crowe + Bob Geldof (The Boomtown Rats)
Tony Hadley, John Keeble, Gary Kemp, Martin Kemp + Steve Norman (Spandau Ballet)
Simon Le Bon, Nick Rodes, John Taylor, Andy Taylor + Roger Taylor (Duran Duran)
Bono + Adam Clayton (U2)
Rick Parfitt + Francis Rossi (Status Quo)
Sara Dallin, Keren Woodward + Siobhan Fahey (Bananarama)
Boy George + Jon Moss (Culture Club)
Robert "Kool" Bell, James "J.T." Taylor + Dennis Thomas (Kool & the Gang)
Glenn Gregory + Martyn Ware (Heaven 17)
George Michael
Phil Collins
Sting
Paul Weller
Paul Young
Marilyn
Jody Watley

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