Song for lifeboat heroes proves charity single's days aren't over

It was great to read in the Weekly about the song, “200 years” written by Roger Smith to celebrate 200 years of the RNLI and hopefully raise some much deserved funds for the organisation. I’ve put the link to the song at the bottom of this article. Now I am not a complete novice to the charity record having written two songs for the exact purpose. One a Christmas song originally for Children in Need and one in aid of the Poppy Appeal, now the Christmas one did get played on national radio, but sales did not exactly send the cash registers alight,

It got me to thinking about charity records in general and is their day done? I hope not as charities like us at Torbay Hospital Radio need to explore every avenue to raise funds and why not do it with a song. There are many high profile examples, such as “Do they know it’s Christmas” by Band Aid, which raised £8 million for Ethiopia within a year of its release in 1984. There’s been a lot more collected since, with two more versions being subsequently issued, all three reached number one in the UK.
It is commonly acknowledged that ex-Beatle George Harrison's "Bangla Desh" in 1971 was the first charity single. Since then there have been countless sorties into the genre. In America they have less of an affinity to charity records. USA for Africa's "We Are the World" in 1985 was a huge hit, but afterwards record buyers over the pond lost interest in the concept. However here In the UK the love affair continues.

Most recently Ladbaby had five  Christmas No. 1’s between 2018 to beating the record set by the Beatles, who had four in 1960’s. And just last month Mark Knopfler's Guitar Heroes released "Going Home (Theme from Local Hero)" in aid of the Teenage Cancer Trust, this is getting plenty of airplay and when I penned this article it was new in the charts at number 18. So clearly the genre is not dead just yet. The genre offers a lot of variety, and artists large and small have given it a try. Here’s a couple of examples.

“Thank You Baked Potato" by Matt Lucas was released in aid of the 2020  FeedNHS Campaign and got inside the top 40. You may have missed that one! In 2018 "With A Little Help From My Friends", (Beatles songs are popular charity choices) by the NHS Voices did poorly by scraped into the top 90, but still raised valuable funds. So if your cause needs to raise some funds, why not write a song, you never know your luck!
https://torbaylifeboat.co.uk/200%20years/