Remember When: The Hooters Open Live Aid in America to the Dismay of the Event’s Main Organizer in 1985

There was no more prestigious stage on which a musician could appear in 1985 than Live Aid. Whether in London or Philadelphia, the concerts featured a list of musical luminaries the likes of which we may never see assembled in such a fashion again.

Videos by American Songwriter

Quick question for you: Who opened the Philadelphia show? It happened to be a Philly band called The Hooters, who were only just beginning their journey. Their presence confounded many at first, most notably the catalyst behind the entire event.

Geldof Passes the Buck

Bob Geldof was the driving force behind Live Aid, held on July 13, 1985. He had spearheaded the philanthropic, star-studded British single “Do They Know It’s Christmas?”, which led in turn to “We Are The World”, the American version. And he fostered the idea of a massive, multi-continent concert spectacle to raise funds and awareness for starving Ethiopians.

Needless to say, Geldof was a bit busy putting together this event, the logistics of which were overwhelming to wrangle. As such, he needed to do some delegating. One of the areas where he passed the buck was in selecting the acts that would appear in the American portion of the show.

For that, he relied on legendary American concert promoter Bill Graham and Larry Magid, who had made his bones putting on big shows in Philly. Magic had ties to the manager of a local band whose first major-label album was starting to make waves. The band was The Hooters.

Local Boys Done Good

Eric Bazilian and Rob Hyman, a pair of ace singer/songwriters, had formed The Hooters a few years earlier. An independent album called Amore gained them local exposure in 1983. That same year, the pair played major roles as instrumentalists and writers on Cyndi Lauper’s massive debut album. Hyman even co-wrote the big hit single “Time After Time”.

With those feathers in their cap, The Hooters moved to a major label (Columbia) and released the album Nervous Night. They re-recorded a few songs from Amore for the new album, including “All You Zombies”, which they released as the first single in March of ’85. The LP itself came out in May.

Just two months later, the Hooters were on stage at JFK Stadium opening up Live Aid. They played a pair of songs, “And We Danced” and “All You Zombies”. The hometown crowd propped them up, and they delivered an energetic performance. But unless you watched it the first time around, you might not know they were even there.

Hooters Who?

The Hooters’ appearance that July day was excluded from the official DVD release of Live Aid. It’s likely that had something to do with the opinion of Bob Geldof. Geldof made no secret at the time of his disappointment that what he considered an unknown band wasn’t just on the bill but was actually leading it off.

The good news is, at the time, Live Aid offered a great springboard for the band. After their appearance, “And We Danced” and “Day By Day” became big hit singles for the group. They’ve enjoyed a long career in the wake of that memorable appearance.

In fact, they once played shows in Europe where the opening act was none other than Bob Geldof. It’s not known whether he registered his displeasure on those occasions about The Hooters’ most famous gig.

Photo by Paul Natkin/Getty Images