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Boy George on why Culture Club didn’t perform at Live Aid: ‘It would have ended our careers’

27 June 2025, 09:16

Boy George in the Smooth studio and a photo of Live Aid — Boy George has opened up about why he and his band were unable to make it to Live Aid forty years ago. Picture: Getty/Smooth Radio

By Hannah Watkin

The ‘Karma Chameleon’ band were instrumental to Band Aid’s ‘Do They Know It’s Christmas?’, but missed the next year’s iconic Wembley show.

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Boy George has revealed why Culture Club were absent from 1985’s iconic Live Aid celebrations.

Speaking with Smooth Radio’s Jenni Falconer about his latest solo album, SE18, the ‘Do You Really Want to Hurt Me’ singer opened up about why he and his band missed the concert while reflecting on its 40th anniversary.

“The reason [we] didn’t do it was cause I wasn’t well, I was a mess,” the 64-year-old explained.

“It would have been the worst thing I could’ve done,” he continued. “So I was like: ‘Guys, I’m not doing Live Aid. Cause like, I’m not match fit.’

Watch Boy George and Jenni's full interview below:

'It would have ended our career': Boy George talks missing Live Aid & new album

“In the way that it made a lot of people’s careers, it would have ended ours!” he reflected.

The ‘It’s a Miracle’ star has no regrets about having had to sit Live Aid out, however.

“It is [a shame],” he conceded, but added: “I’m very much about now, I don’t sit around thinking: ‘I wish I’d done that.’ I don’t live in the past – it doesn’t exist.”

Boy George and Culture Club had a key role in Band Aid’s ‘Do They Know It’s Christmas?’, Bob Geldof and Midge Ure’s original charity project.

Bob Geldof reminisces about Band Aid 40 years on and addresses Ed Sheeran comments

In the past, it’s even been suggested the ‘Everything I Own’ singer was responsible for inspiring Bob with the idea of putting together a live concert for the cause.

But speaking with Jenni, Boy George was reluctant to take credit for the idea. “Maybe, I don’t know. I don’t think I can take credit for that,” he said.

Free from focusing on the past, George has his sights firmly set on achieving a lot in the present.

His latest album, the summery and joyful pop-reggae record SE18, is out now on CD and vinyl – but the singer is avoiding streaming.

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“It’s time to have a different relationship with my audience. My audience like things they can hold,” he explained.

“I feel like by putting stuff out just on vinyl and CD, it’s kind of old school, [but] it means that people who want physical product can have a full experience with the music.”

An artist, DJ and theatre star as well as singer, Boy George confessed he needs “variety” in his career “or else I get bored very quickly,” he said.

After recently completing a second run performing the role of flamboyant nightclub owner Harold Zidler in the Broadway production of Moulin Rouge, next on the cards for George is a series of DJ sets in Ibiza, as well as a few festival performances with his band.

Boy George performing in March 2025. Picture: Alamy

Culture Club are also the focus of an upcoming documentary film, which premiered recently at America’s Tribeca film festival.

George wasn’t able to be there for the event, but sung the praises of the “hilarious” but also “quite serious” look at the band.

“My visa ran out,” he said, explaining his absence from Boy George & Culture Club’s premiere. “But what you’ve got to remember is the documentary wasn’t for me,” he later reflected.

“It’s not made for me, so I don’t have to feel anything particular about it. But bits of it made me very sentimental, made me laugh, and there were some bits that I thought were really important,” he added.