BARRIE, ON – The hosts of the Canadian Live 8 show at Park Place had an emphatic message for one critic of the event: “Rex Murphy sucks!”
Leave it to the comedians to make the day’s most serious point. Dan Aykroyd and Tom Green did just that in response to Murphy’s recent column in the Globe and Mail, entitled “Let us excori8 Live 8.”
Aykroyd, who clenched the article in his fist, read from the acid-tongued harpooners’ column:
“But in the end it will be just one more self-absorbed, pretentious, hollow celebrity shtick, another moment for ex-punk stars and rock maestros in decline to strut before the world's lights and cameras for a moment more.”
As boos rained from the close to 36,000 in attendance, Aykroyd added some of his own
shots for Murphy:
“I won’t let you be complacent. He says celebrity is dangerous, complacency is dangerous,” yelled the former Blues Brother, as he threw the offensive column into the crowd. “Are we going to tell our children that we did nothing? Or that we did something?”
MORE BOO BIRDS
Apparently, there weren't too many Celine Dion fans at Park Place. When Ackroyd and Tom Green introduced the Quebec pop diva, the jeers were so loud that it drowned out the co-hosts.
ARDEN RECOUNTS HER ETHIOPIA TRIP
Immediately following Aykroyd’s Rex Murphy rant, singer Jann Arden appeared in the media tent and captivated all within earshot with her account of her trip to Ethiopia last January.
Arden, who made the trip on the behest of World Vision, recounted how she was forced to sign a “kidnapping waiver” before departing and that she was torn between her fear of going and her sorrow for the plight of Africans in general.
“I’m scared to go and then I lie in bed and say ‘I have to go,’” confessed Arden, who followed Gordon Lightfoot on stage. “I balled for two days. I don’t particularly like seeing children dying of poverty, it’s sickening. They have nothing they have absolutely nothing. The week I was there I didn’t see anyone eat, so that tells you all you need to know.”
In true Arden fashion the singer injected some of her trademark humour about her appearance at Live 8.
“They needed broads. Have you seen the lineup? They needed broads,” joked Arden, who added she made the trip from her Calgary home “to steal riffs” and proclaim that “Deep Purple has opened for me.”
SURLEY CRUE
Saturday marked Motley Crue bassist Nikki Sixx’s fourth-year of sobriety from heroin addiction, but he didn’t appear at all happy about that or appearing for the Barrie Live 8 show.
First the media was informed of the band’s strange request that none of them be photographed individually and then Sixx became the spokesman out of attrition, as Vince Neil and Tommy Lee both passed up the opportunity to speak.
When he did speak, Sixx had little to say about the event and when queried if the band lobbied to play Barrie or were asked, Sixx snarled: “Like I said before this was the only show we were asked to play.”
Thanks for coming guys.
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