A back massage from Bowie! Bono’s bust-up! Bob Geldof tells us about the wildest moments of Live Aid

Ahead of the 40th anniversary of Live Aid this weekend, we’ve got Bob Geldof to tell us some of his wildest memories of the most successful benefit concert in history.

Taking place simultaneously at London’s Wembley Stadium and Philadelphia’s JFK Stadium, the event raised millions for the famine in Ethiopia and was responsible for delivering some of the most iconic moments in music history. Freddie Mercury‘s greatest ever performance? Check! Paul McCartney‘s first performance since the death of John Lennon? Check! Phil Collins jetting across the Atlantic on Concorde to play both shows in a day? Yep, that happened too.

But for all the successes of the day, there was a few hairier moments too. Speaking to Rolling Stone UK to mark the soundtrack release of Just For One Day: The Live Aid Musical, Bob Geldof tells us about a few moments where the show almost went off the rails.

Bob gets a massage from Bowie

“My back was fucked. I hadn’t slept and I was shitting myself. I was running around on an organisational continuum and I wasn’t in love with the day at all. I was freaking out and I laid down for five minutes on a fucking flight case. Bowie came over and said, ‘What’s wrong with you?’. I said, ‘My back is fucking killing me’. He said, ‘Turn over’ and he started massaging me!

“I was saying, ‘Dave, go down further!’ and suddenly the door opened and Garry [Roberts], the guitarist in the Boomtown Rats said, ‘What are you doing? We’re on’. I just walked on stage after that massage and the minute I did, I wasn’t nervous because I was doing my job. The rest was not my job. It was frightening. The enormity of it.”

Bono and U2 have a bust-up

‘U2 were famously brilliant, but I remember them having a huge fucking row at the side of the stage and I thought Bono was going to be fired! Every band had three songs and they had yet to do ‘Pride (In the Name of Love)’ which was going to be their big moment to kick off. He had three songs and he did his Bono thing of going into the crowd and making a personal connection like the great showman he is.

“He picked a girl who he said was being crushed and gave her a hug in the pit, but knowing full well that the cameras were there and this was going all around the world. The band had to keep playing and we had this green light, red light system going on. Green lights are good, orange light, you’ve got a minute and red light, you’re gone. It didn’t matter who you were. Freddie Mercury and you’re on red? Gone!

”So anyway, the red light came up and they walked off without playing ‘Pride’. There’s a great picture of me which I only saw recently where I’ve got my arm out and saying, ‘You were fucking great man’ to Bono. But his face said it all and he’s said before that they wanted to fire him. Paul McGuinness, their manager, told them to wait for the reviews. But they didn’t need to wait, because the fucking band kicked off!”

McCartney’s nerves for his first show in five years

“Paul hadn’t played since John died and he was fucking shitting himself. It was Linda and Stella that made him do it. I wrote to him and said please do the one song. Because you need a Beatle to give you a proper blessing. He was driving up from Sussex, he had the radio on and he was crapping himself, according to Linda. He wanted to turn back. He wanted to make up an excuse. He gets there, he goes on stage and this is the first time since John died so it’s a big thing and his mic breaks down. Fucking hell. The crowd sang the whole of Let It Be for him. At that point, Pete Townshend grabs me and says we’ve gotta help him.

“He grabs me and Bowie and we go out on stage. So you’ve got Paul McCartney, David Bowie, Pete Townshend…and me. Fuck off! I mean, fuck off! I just thought, ‘I am not worthy’. This was the end of the show and his performance was so beautiful. There was not a dry eye in the house.”