There’s always a frisson of excitement when Bob Geldof is back in town and this time round there are a couple of reasons why he should have popped up again. Firstly it’s the fiftieth anniversary of his band, the Boomtown Rats, the Dublin punk band famous for their chart-topping hits ‘Rat Trap‘ and ‘I Don’t Like Mondays‘. The group has recently been touring theatres and city halls throughout the UK.

Secondly it’s the fortieth anniversary of Live Aid, the world-wide live TV rock event he organised to raise funds for famine relief in Ethiopia. Who can forget Freddie Mercury and Queen’s historic performance at Wembley Stadium with other stars of the day like George Michael, David Bowie and the timeless Neil Young?  Or Geldof’s international exhortation “Give us your fucking money!”

There is also a new book Live Aid – The Definitive 40 Year Story by Paul Vallely, a former broadsheet journalist who travelled with Geldof in Africa. This was launched on the sixth storey of Foyles Bookshop in London’s city centre. It was essentially a laid-back soirée for fans, devoid of hectoring journos asking embarrassing questions. Except for me, of course, who has known Bob since the ’70s, having interviewed him for everybody from Record Mirror, where his first wife Paula Yates, was a wonderfully gossipy colleague, to Hello! magazine and The Times.

The last time I saw him he was looking and sounding uncouth at the Rebellion festival in Blackpool almost a decade ago. This time round he’s wearing a smart dark suit and matching collar and tie highlighting a tamed barnet. His hair is less silver fox than pure white. “That’s because I’m 74 and old,” he declares, “we all are,” he goes on, referring to the five other trustees of the Band Aid Charitable Trust which Bob chairs. In the book there’s an email he sent to them all suggesting that it was time to call it a day:

“The politics that govern the world have moved away from the politics we grew up with and easy to manipulate,” he wrote. “We are all old and have little to say about this any more and whatever we do say is easily dismissed as being from another time. Band Aid’s time has been and, if not gone, could go relatively quietly and easily … I personally would like to bow out. I feel I’m done.”

At Foyles Geldof went into more detail:  “The UK of 1984 and 1985 was one of deeply generous people and we went on the raise £140 million and without that money millions more would be dead today. But in an era of social media there’s so much more to occupy people’s minds. Apart from the media itself being fragmented, there are more pressing issues closer to home from Ukraine and the Middle East to the cost-of-living crisis.

“Plus more people have seen Live Aid on YouTube than they ever did on terrestrial TV. There’s a whole new generation out there… and it’s mainly girls. Taylor Swift and Lady Gaga who I’d like to thank for making such a big effort during lockdown. It’s nice to see the TikTok world actually talking to each other! But as Paul Vallely was saying, rock ‘n’ roll is no longer the central spine of modern culture. Despite all the great music and songs, I can’t imagine we’d get funds by accessing the likes of Donald Trump and Bill Gates.

“Whereas back in the day I could speak quietly to Thatcher and get her onside by using techniques like cajoling and charm, the world now seems to be a narrower and more chaotic place.”

Talking about big leaders, what would a Bob show be like without a few opinions and anecdotes about those he has met?  According to one report, Geldof called military dictator Mengistu Haile Mariam a “murdering c**t” to his face. Bob is only too pleased to elucidate: “We’d gone on a trip to check out that food was being distributed properly and found ourselves being marched around by Soviet soldiers. There was a barn which was supposedly full of grain but this dictator demanded a million quid just to see it. So that’s what I called him and got away with it because I came from a rock ‘n’ roll as opposed to a political background.

“George Bush Snr was a good ole boy who should never have been President but I learned a lot like asking for eight things and being lucky to get two and making civil servants realise you know as much as them. I appreciate Tony Blair isn’t everybody’s cup of tea but I found him most impressive.”

But his highest praise goes to that star of record (the anti-apartheid Free Nelson Mandela by The Special AKA) and Africa in general, Nelson Mandela. “He was a most dignified old man,” Geldof enthuses, “an extraordinary all-round human being. Just look what he achieved: the first black lawyer in Africa, a boxer and someone with a vast open mind who would not bend. I had many conversations with him,” he says about the activist who went from prison to becoming the first president of South Africa.

Modesty has never been Bob’s middle name but he claims to have been brought down to earth at Live Aid when he found himself singing along with Pete Townshend of The Who, David Bowie and Paul McCartney. “They were my teachers, even told me what books to read!  But I’ll tell you something about Macca … there’s no-one more competitive which is probably why he ended up closing the show (with The Beatles’ classic Let It Be).”

And why he remains a role model for Geldof…

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