Band Aid 20 – ‘Do They Know It’s Christmas?’

2 December 2004

Here’s a sobering thought: at Christmas 2024 we’re due a Band Aid 40. Who’ll be on it? Who’ll sing Bono’s Line and why will it be Bono? There’s no need to be afraid – right? In the meantime, here’s the class of 2004 taking their eyes-closed, face-scrunched, hands-on-the-headphones turn at charity Yuletide posterity.

Band Aids I and II were essentially ’80s pop affairs, but Band Aid 20 is very much a rock-out: with Radiohead, Supergrass and a Beatle as the house band, plus that squally guitar coda, perhaps it’s even the Britpop-era ’90s Band Aid that could have been and ‘Perfect Day’ almost was. This partly explains one of the main talking points from the time: the rockist sneering at Dizzee Rascal’s added rap. However, surely that should have been the proper line to take in the first place: if you’re not going to make a new record for a new generation, then at least do something interesting or different with the source material. But no. We now also have a Band Aid 30 for comparison, so I suppose this is what we’ll be getting once a decade for eternity.

The only other notable innovation in 2004 is the increased self-awareness and seriousness. Yes, that’s not hard given they’re following in the Grolsch-capped shoes of Bros, but that studied sombreness makes this Band Aid 20 a plodding chore. Not helping is the lack of star power and charisma. The 1984 original had Boy George followed by George Michael and then Simon Le Bon; in 2004 we get Chris Martin handing over the flaccid baton of bland, lacklustre insipidity to Dido. The poor unfortunate Sugababes are R&B-pop stars sinking in landfill-indie stodge; to borrow a phrase, well tonight thank God it’s them instead of you. Band Aid 40: bet you can’t wait!