One of the things that signals "Christmas" to me is hearing The Kink's
Father Christmas on the radio. Not familiar with it? It's the story of a charity bell-ringer who gets mugged by a bunch of kids who tell him, flat out, that they need money and jobs, not toys. Then there's Jethro Tull's
Another Christmas Song (
Lyrics). Seems British artists have a grand tradition of heaping on the guilt and moral lessons at Christmastime!
But they all bow before the absolute masterpiece of holiday guilt: Bob Geldof's world-changing
Do They Know It's Christmas? (Feed the World).
I always compare this to the "USA for Africa" effort
We are the World and find the latter utterly lacking. Band Aid focuses squarely on the problem: There is a drought, people are starving, we can do something about it. Feed the World. USA for Africa settled for a mushy feel-good message about how we are all living on this planet or something. Band Aid hits you with with lyrical imagery designed to shake you into understanding that things are not right. USA for Africa? Sorry, I got nothing from their song. You can tell a lot about the mindsets from just two lines:
Band Aid:
"Feed the world, let them know it's Christmastime again"USA for Africa:
"We are the world, We are the children, We are the ones who make a brighter day, So let's start giving"The British song spends most of it's time talking about the famine victims. The US one is self-congratulatory.
I'm not denying that both songs were effective in raising money and awareness, it's just that Band Aid was so much better!
Feed the World
