On April 13, 1985, a charity single reached Number One on the USA’s Billboard “Hot 100”: “We Are the World” (video up top) by supergroup “USA for Africa”. The song, written by Michael Jackson and Lionel Ritchie and produced by Quincy Jones, became one of the fastest selling singles in history at the time, and would be at the top of the “Hot 100” for four weeks. The song was included on the featured the album also named We Are the World.
The song was inspired by the previous year’s charity single “Do They Know It's Christmas?”, which was the subject of my post ”Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 20: Seasonal songs” on December 29 of last year. Harry Belafonte had the idea for an American charity single, and the rest is history.
I had mixed feelings about the song at the time. Just as with “Do They Know It’s Christmas”, I appreciated that famous people are often in the best position to raise money for charitable causes, and I absolutely supported that. However, the song itself didn’t grab me, even though the chorus was catchy (at the time I felt it was catchy in an annoying way). So, I never bought the single or the album. On the other hand, I thought the lyrics weren’t as lame as for “Do They Know It’s Christmas”, even though I liked that song better. I think the biggest reason for the difference in my reaction to the two songs 40 years ago us that “Do They Know It’s Christmas” was first, which made it feel fresh, and perhaps that made “We Are the World” feel like a bit of a retread for me. I was much choosier in what I liked back then, and arguably much harsher in my opinions about pop songs.
I have one particular purely personal memory of the song. A friend and I were discussing it, and he said that it was “ruined” when Brice Springsteen first started singing his part. While neither of us were fans of his, unlike my friend, I quite liked a lot of his songs. The vocal I disliked was Bob Dylan’s first section. Over the next forty years, I eventually liked most of Springsteen’s work, and even bought some of his music, making me not exactly a fan, but certainly “fan adjacent”. However, that wasn’t the case with Dylan’s music. I’ve said many times that my pop music tastes have constantly changed, broadened, and mellowed over the course of my life, but I never said my taste became all-inclusive. Somethings really don’t change.
“We Are the World” (the song) reached Number One in Australia, Canada (3x Platinum), New Zealand (Platinum), the UK (Silver), and also on the USA’s Billboard “Hot 100”, as well as on their “Adult Contemporary”, “Hot Dance/Disco 12 Inch Singles Sales”, and “Hot Black Singles” charts (that last chart name sounds more like an 0900 number from those days…). It was also Number 27 on the Billboard “Mainstream Rock” chart, and reached Number One on the Cash Box “Top Singles” chart. The song was certified 4x Platinum in the USA.
The album We Are the World reached Number 6 in Australia, Number 6 in New Zealand (Platinum), Number 31 the UK, as well as Number One on the “Billboard 200” (3x Platinum). It didn’t chart in Canada.
This series will return May 11 with the next Number One from 1985.
Previously in the “Weekend Diversion – 1985” series:
Weekend Diversion: 1985, Part 1 – February 2, 2025
Weekend Diversion: 1985, Part 2 – February 16, 2025
Weekend Diversion: 1985, Part 3 – March 12, 2025
Weekend Diversion: 1985, Part 4 – March 30, 2025
2 comments:
Interesting. I thought Bruce was jarring at 1st, but I liked the juxtaposition w Stevie. I thought Q making Dylan sounding even remotely musical in an ensemble was remarkable. I have a lot of Buice and Bob, but also a lot of Bob covers.
That was pretty much what I thought about Bruce paired with Stevie, too. And I thought some of Bob's later vocals were less jarring that his first entry.
Post a Comment