14 DAY TRIAL // Not too long ago, music producer and television personality Simon Cowell said he would be getting as many stars as possible for a cover of REM’s “Everybody Hurts” for Haiti relief. Most of the singers who agreed to take part in the campaign are from the UK or come from Cowell’s X Factor, which makes it so that the single is more for the European market. However, fans in the US will also be getting one such music release, thanks to Lionel Richie, as Rolling Stone can confirm.
Richie, who was also behind the original 1985 hit, with Michael Jackson, got over 100 singers to agree to participate in a remake of the classic “We Are the World,” whose proceeds will go straight to organizations in charge of helping victims of the recent earthquake in Haiti. They include, to name just a few, Jay-Z, Lady Gaga, Barbra Streisand, Justin Timberlake, Celine Dion, Wyclef Jean, Justin Bieber and the Jonas brothers.
“Lady Gaga, Eminem, Jay-Z, Justin Timberlake and Barbra Streisand are just a handful of the 100-plus stars scheduled to take part in a re-recording of ‘We Are the World’ to benefit Haiti, producer RedOne told Rolling Stone yesterday at the Grammys. Other artists contributing to the new ‘We Are the World’ – a remake of the 1985 USA for Africa charity single that was co-written by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie – include Celine Dion, Fergie, Wyclef, Enrique Iglesias and more musicians who attended yesterday’s 52nd Annual Grammy Awards,” Rolling Stone writes.
“I’m so delighted and so happy to get a dream call from Quincy Jones and Randy Phillips and Lionel Richie. I know that Lionel Richie has been asked like 150-something times to redo ‘We Are the World’ and he said no to everything until this Haiti thing happened. […] With music you want to help people feel something in a certain way, and this is something devastating that just happened and I am and we are the world. We’re going to be helping people that we don’t know. I have Haitian friends and stuff like that, but we’re going to be helping people that need help right now,” RedOne said for the mag, speaking of what an honor it was to have been asked to work on the track as a producer.
According to MTV, the stars’ contribution in the new campaign does not end when they’re done recording in the studio. The entire recording process has been caught on tape – with some segments already being released to the media in advance of the official song – and will be put out on NBC on February 12, during the Opening Ceremony of the Winter Olympics, as “We Are the World – 25 for Haiti.”