The Greatest Night in Pop (We Are the World documentary)

Since the Steve Martin docu got its own thread, i figured this one deserved one as well .




Finished watching the Netflix documentary The Greatest Night in Pop about the making of the We are The World song in 1985… Magnificent… If you enjoy a good nostalgia trip every once in a while, like I do, it’s a pretty extraordinary film… If I could think of any more adjectives, I would use them,… Some of my personal favorite moments:

• Paul Simon, turning to all of the gathered superstars in the room, every big name in the music industry at that time, and saying “holy sheete, if a bomb hits this place tonight, John Denver is back on top”

• Diana Ross walking up to freaking Daryl Hall of all people, and saying “I am your biggest fan, would you mind signing my music sheet?”

• another take away for me is that no human being in the history of mankind has ever looked, or felt, or acted as out of place, as Bob Dylan seem to be in that room on that night .

• Steve Perry giving notes to Huey Lewis on how to hang vocally with Cyndi Lauper

• Huey Lewis has a hairy back… At one point he says, “hearing all of those voices in the room, made the hair stand up on my back”

• Sheila E being used, asked to be a part of it as a conduit to try and get Prince to come to the recording, which he never did.. so Huey Lewis replaced him for that solo line… I was today years old when I learned about this

• Has there ever been a more beautiful woman on earth than Diana Ross in her prime ?

One other thing i found odd is that Dan Ackroyd was included in the recording and is featured a lot in the documentary.. i realize that Ghostbusters was huge at that time- but wouldn’t it have made more sense to have Ray Parker Jr there, who sang the song- rather than Ackroyd who was in the movie ??