Rock Aid Armenia
Rock Aid Armenia was a music project founded in 1989 by Jon Dee to help the victims of the Spitak earthquake in Armenia. In addition to a re-release of the song What's Going On by various British artists, the Deep Purple title Smoke on the Water was re-recorded and released with numerous well-known musicians . In addition, a compilation album was created with titles by other artists made available free of charge, as well as a home video. The project continues today.
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Location of the epicenter in Armenia |
On December 7, 1988, an earthquake shook the area around the northern Armenian city of Spitak ( Lori Province ) in the Soviet Union . With an estimated number of at least 25,000 dead and a million homeless, it is one of the worst earthquakes in decades. As a result, humanitarian aid operations by Western organizations in the Soviet Union took place for the first time during the Cold War .
The earthquake struck the region at 11:41 a.m. local time (7:41 a.m. UTC ). It had a magnitude of 6.9 on the moment magnitude scale , the epicenter was about 18 kilometers northwest of Spitak. Compared to other earthquakes of similar magnitude , it caused devastating damage, on the one hand because the hypocenter was only about five kilometers below the earth's surface, and on the other hand because the structural fabric of the buildings in Spitak and the surrounding villages was extremely poor. Four minutes after the main quake, an aftershock with a magnitude of 5.8 shook the region; in the following months, further aftershocks up to a maximum magnitude of 5.0 were registered.
The information on the number of victims varies widely. Often 25,000 deaths are mentioned, while other sources report significantly higher numbers. Nevertheless, around 15,000 people were rescued from the collapsed buildings in the first hours after the quake.
After the news of the disaster, the then Soviet head of state, Mikhail Gorbachev , who came from the Caucasus, returned from a state visit to the USA and visited the earthquake region. In view of the extent of the damage, Gorbachev asked the United States for humanitarian aid after a few days, regardless of the Cold War , for the first time after the Second World War . As a result, several western countries in the Caucasus provided aid, including Germany and Switzerland .
Music project
Jon Dee, an Australian campaign activist, saw footage and pictures from the disaster area and later described:
“ The material I got from Armenia was really terrible. Entire communities had been wiped off the map. The streets were full of people lamenting the loss of family members. Schools had collapsed and many children had been killed. The saddest pictures were of people carrying small coffins with dead babies in them. The disaster zone was a cold and hopeless place. "
What's going on
Dee decided to recruit musicians for a relief effort. The first disaster relief release was the re-recording of What's Going On , which was interpreted by Boy George , Aswad , Errol Brown , Richard Derbyshire and various other British artists.
Smoke on the water
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But Dee also wanted to have Smoke on the Water re-recorded and published, so he contacted David Gilmour ( Pink Floyd ), who was enthusiastic about the idea and agreed to support it. He allowed Dee to use his name to attract more musicians to the project. Ultimately, Bryan Adams , Geoff Beauchamp , Ritchie Blackmore , Bruce Dickinson , Geoff Downes , Keith Emerson , Ian Gillan , David Gilmour, Tony Iommi , Alex Lifeson , Brian May , Paul Rodgers , Chris Squire and Roger Taylor re-recorded the title together. Ian Gillan (Deep Purple), the singer of the original, Bruce Dickinson of Iron Maiden and Paul Rodgers shared the singing of the individual stanzas .
The recording in the Metropolis Studios in Chiswick , London , began on July 8, 1989. In a total of five sessions, the single was produced by Gary Langan and Geoff Downes. After its release, it hit the UK charts and reached its top position on December 30, 1989 (39th place). A radio mix enriched with keyboards was also made, which appeared on the 1990 album The Earthquake .
The Earthquake Album
In 1990 a compilation album entitled The Earthquake Album and a VHS video were released, which contained songs donated by various artists. For these releases, artists such as Pink Floyd , Bon Jovi , Iron Maiden , Led Zeppelin , Emerson, Lake and Palmer , Gary Moore , Black Sabbath , Asia , Mike & the Mechanics , Rush , Deep Purple , Foreigner , Yes , Whitesnake and other songs provided and video clips available.
Full metal rackets
Rock Aid Armenia's last project consisted of a re-recording of the Led Zeppelin song Rock and Roll , which was recorded by a band consisting of Steve Harris and Nicko McBrain of Iron Maiden on bass and drums, Andy Barnett (guitar) and the Tennis players John McEnroe and Pat Cash (both guitar) consisted of. The song was released in 1991.
Smoke on the Water - The Metropolis Sessions
In 2010, 21 years after its initial release, Jon Dee released the accompanying DVD EP Smoke on the Water - The Metropolis Sessions . It contained a remix of the song created by Dee and Josh Wermut in 2010, as well as the original mix from 1989, the radio mix from 1990 and a recording of Ian Gillan's vocal recording for the 1989 television documentary. The DVD contained the video clip from 1989 and the contribution The Making of Smoke on the Water .
Regarding his motives for the re-release, Dee wrote:
“ Two years ago I was informed by Ara Tadevosyan about the current situation in the earthquake region. Life is still very difficult for the people there and we found out that a children's music school in Gyumri could still not be rebuilt. So we decided to bring the project back to life. Every penny of the money we make will go towards rebuilding this school. "
The Who Cares project, launched by Ian Gillan and Tony Iommi in 2011, is dedicated to the same goal, bringing constancy to efforts to rebuild the school.
Aftertaste
In October 2009, Jon Dee and the musicians involved in the project in Yerevan by the Armenian Prime Minister Tigran Sergsyan the Order of Honor , the highest award of the country awarded. In addition to Dee, Ian Gillan, Tony Iommi and Brian May also attended the ceremony.
swell
- ↑ Soviet Union When the Earth Shook Article in Time magazine , December 19, 1988
- ↑ The indication “strength 10-11”, which can be found sporadically on the Internet, is related to the earthquake scale used in the Soviet Union at that time (see Medvedev scale ), which deviates from the scale used in the West.
- ↑ a b c National Geophysical Data Center (NGDC)
- ↑ Homepage of the Youth Red Cross Baden-Württemberg ( Memento of the original from July 21, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Homepage of the ORF ( Memento of the original from May 29, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ a b Liner Notes for the Re-Release of Smoke on the Water , 2010
- ↑ Rock Aid Armenia in the UK charts
- ↑ The Sunday Morning Herald: Deep Purple, deep pockets - price for Rock Aid fundraiser ; October 3, 2009
