Fact #141415

Eric Clapton : For most of 1985, apart from August and September, I was out on the road promoting Behind the Sun. In the early part of that summer I got a phone call from Pete Townshend, asking if I would play in a charity event being organized by Bob Geldof to raise money for the victims of famine in Africa. It was to be called “Live Aid” and to consist mainly of two concerts played simultaneously in London and Philadelphia on July 13 and broadcast live on TV across the world. As it happened, on that date my band and I were to be in the middle of a North American tour. We were booked to play Las Vegas the night before, with shows in Denver on either side, so there were some pretty big leaps involved. I told my manager, Roger Forrester, to cancel the Las Vegas show, and called Pete to say we’d do it. Thank God we were in good shape, with the band playing really well, because had we just started our tour, I might have had second thoughts.

Landing in Philadelphia the day before the show, one couldn’t help but get swept up in the atmosphere. The place was just buzzing. The moment we landed, you could feel music everywhere. We checked into the Four Seasons Hotel, every room of which was filled with musicians. It was Music City, and, like most people, I was awake most of the night before the concert. I couldn’t sleep due to nerves.
(Source : Clapton: The Autobiography, by Eric Clapton, Broadway Books/Random House, Inc., 2007 )