On July 13, 1985, the world was watching. Live Aid wasn’t just another concert—it was a cultural moment where music tried to heal the world, raising funds for Ethiopian famine relief while uniting nearly 2 billion viewers across 150 nations.
In the middle of this historic day, a moment unfolded that was as chaotic as it was legendary: Bob Dylan, Keith Richards, and Ronnie Wood took the stage together to perform Dylan’s timeless anthem, “Blowin’ In The Wind.”
It was the end of a long day of music at Philadelphia’s JFK Stadium when the trio shuffled onto the stage, guitars slung low, visibly unrehearsed but undeniably magnetic.
Bob Dylan, the poet of a generation, stood at the mic, his voice frayed but alive with urgency. On either side, Keith Richards and Ron Wood, the Rolling Stones’ resident pirates, tried to keep the song’s structure intact as technical issues and tuning chaos created an unexpectedly raw soundscape.
And yet, in all that imperfection, something real happened.
“Blowin’ In The Wind” has always been more than just a song; it’s a question, a challenge to the world to look inward and demand change. Singing it at Live Aid, with famine relief and global unity at the event’s core, felt like the song had found its moment once again.
There was no polish to this performance—no backing band, no overdubs, no polished harmonies. The trio’s guitars fell out of tune, vocals overlapped, and the song’s structure wavered.
But that vulnerability reflected exactly what Live Aid was about: humanity coming together, flaws and all, to do something bigger than itself.
Midway through, Dylan broke a guitar string, leaving Wood to hand over his instrument while Richards attempted to maintain the rhythm. It was a moment both humorous and symbolic: even legends need a hand sometimes, even in front of the entire world.
That image—Ronnie Wood giving his guitar to Dylan, Richards strumming along with his signature loose swagger—remains an enduring Live Aid snapshot.
