While we waited for the next band to take the stage, we crowd surfed. Like dolphins, we bopped beach balls that were the size of small housing subdivisions. And we guzzled our Pepsi, the cola Choice of a new Generation.
In the 1980s and 90s, there was no problem that we, as Generation X, couldn’t solve with a benefit concert.
First, there was Live Aid. We solved world hunger. In fact, Phil Collins solved the hunger problem gripping the two cities of Philadelphia and London in one day. Yes, the ‘In The Air Tonight’ guy hopped the Concorde and played at both benefit concerts that day. That’s the kind of tenacity we had in the 80s.
Feeling emboldened, we then saved corn with Farm Aid.
Next up, we ended South African apartheid. There wasn’t even a concert for that one. We were so powerful by then that it just took that one song, ‘Sun City’.
After Freddie Mercury died, HIV and AIDS were no match for that benefit concert. Eradicated like polio.
And as a finale to the 90s, before we all hung up our flannel shirts to enjoy the better world we created for humanity until the year 2099, we took on China and tackled freeing Tibet.
Each time there were hundreds of thousands of us, packed into a sports-turned-concert stadium and we bronzed and bonded under the pre-ozone damaged sunny skies. We could hear the money pouring in from across the globe. All without smartphones, even!
And at the end of each concert, King Bono from U2 would come out and pass a new law, then we would get whipped into a celebratory frenzy, and all go home.
Did you lose count of the number of nights we all stumbled home, hopped up on Zima, and loudly group singing Blind Melon’s ‘No Rain’ across the globe, too?
All I can say is that my life is pretty plain! (c’mon, you know it)
You don’t like my point of view and I’m insane!
Yup. We slept well with the knowledge that the world was a better place from our efforts.
Our parents had to take up arms to fight the Nazis. And today, everyone changes their Facebook avatars and IG feeds every few weeks to show support for the latest cause. A black square or the Ukraine flag. Oh, the work that involves! Can you imagine?
But us, Generation X, to change things? We went to concerts. And we saved the world.
Clearly.
Your turn, Gen Z.