noelindublin wrote:

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In the meantime he's proved he's a bona fide pop/rock star again, with the Rats comeback, so we need not worry  too much about his being a 'forgotten' pop star.

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Strange he is often referred to as "The former Boomtown Rats singer" 

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/music/music-news/11220735/Band-Aid-30-line-up-revealed.html

The former Boomtown Rats singer said he was inspired to raise money for the fight against Ebola by a call from the United Nations and reading about the bravery of nurses and doctors who had flown out to treat victims.

People forget he was ASKED to do this by the UN.

Jules wrote:

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I'm banning people left right and centre of FB. Most of it is nastiness for the sake of it, with no argument behind if obscured facts.

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 Ah, so glad the Band Aid/Live Aid/Live 8 forum is hidden away these days.  Saves me a whole lot of unnecessary bother.   

ArrGee wrote:

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JoanOfArc wrote:

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Africa feed itself.

England feed itself.

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Bl00dy hell, if England has to feed itself, we'd all starve.  UK imports more than 40% of the total food consumed.  We spend close to £20bn on food imports.   It is envisaged that in 20 years time that without significant increases in yield that Britain will face  food shortages as those countries that export will have less to export due to their own indigenous demands.  

 

 

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Arrgee, you're right that we rely heavily on food imports.  however, I read that we would only have to use 20% of UK arable land for vegan crops to feed our entire uk population self sufficiently.  presumably this should leave enough land if we were to eat animal produce too, to do this with.  

there's also this:  In 1975, the Scottish ecologist Kenneth Mellanby wrote a short book called Can Britain Feed Itself? His answer was yes, if we eat less meat. The way in which he worked it out was simple, almost a back of the envelope job, but it provides a useful template for making similar calculations. In this article I have adapted and embellished Mellanbys basic diet to show how much land modern UK agriculture might require to produce the food we need under six different agricultural regimes chemical, organic and permacultural, each with or without livestock.

http://www.thelandmagazine.org.uk/articles/can-britain-feed-itself

JoanOfArc wrote:

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  In 1975, the Scottish ecologist Kenneth Mellanby wrote a short book called Can Britain Feed Itself? His answer was yes, if we eat less meat... 

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 But that was about 40 years ago.  The population is bigger and there is less land available for growing crops.  People barely cook properly these days living on processed food. I am sure that if everyone ate mung beans we could, but by then the economy would have totally collapsed which seems to be hope of this site if you read the other pages. I don't know about you and Mr. Away with the Fairies, who wrote the article but i ain't fcuking living in a yurt eating rice and weeds.

Jules wrote:

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No 1 in 69 countries including the UK.

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 Been thinking about this. Appreciate it was a few weeks ago now and sales will have dropped off (no idea what recent CD issue sales are but suspect it's a tiny fraction of the initial downloads) but it's set me wondering about the role radio has to play in all this.

Do radio stations have a responsibility to reflect public trend, or do they reserve the right to influence it?

The reason I say that is in the month since release I've not heard Capital Radio play the track once. Admittedly it's one station only (maybe not indicative??) and I'm not listening all day, but surely a station playlist includes songs throughout day, and in the breakfast period I've yet to hear it.

If a song is taken to number one by the purchasing public, isn't controversial or offensive, regardless of whether you like it or not it should surely be played, imho.

Over the years numerous tracks have defied the odds and current fashion to capture enough interest to sell in huge numbers and force their way to top of charts, and they've been played even though many people might ridicule them (all the novelty hits spring to mind). Seems like the balance of power has shifted to radio controllers nowadays, in other words 'if it ain't what we think you should be hearing we ain't promoting it'.  

I find that quite sad. I realise they are many 'alternative' stations and associated 'alternative' charts, but official charts are just packed with homogenous hand picked acts.

On the odd occasion a song that doesn't 'fit' shifts millions of units, surely the radio stations have ot concede the public like it, and include it in schedules.

Doubly sad for this song that it's not getting recognition, given what it stands for, even if it's nowhere near the best Band Aid version, let alone best song.....

Are any stations playing this song regularly?