★★★★★ 0/5

Fire Fight Australia a day of music & resilience

Congrats to Paul Dainty, TEG, Seven & Foxtel for a massive memorable event.

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To everyone who was involved in bringing Fire Fight Australia together… thank you.

That was a concert for the ages.

Take a bow Paul Dainty, TEG, Seven and Foxtel for an exhilarating concert. It rocked the house and moved us to tears in equal parts.

Congratulations to producer Julie Ward from ZigZagTV for the concert broadcast, Michael Pell for Seven hosting component and Graham Burrells for producing Foxtel hosting. The mammoth Live broadcast can’t have been easy but it ran almost like clockwork.

Musically it had it all. From the rock royalty of Queen to the pin-drop stadium silence of kd lang, from country Lee Kernaghan to Hilltop Hoods hip hop. There was Delta singing I Am Australian, Tina Arena singing Divinyls, Daryl Braithwaite with his anthemic Horses, 5SOS rockin’ the rafters and Buble crooning from Melbourne. Olivia performed for the first time in 2 years and looked like a goddess.

It would take Farnsy’s You’re the Voice, complete with Brian May on guitar and Mitch Tambo in a First Nations language to top them all. An inspired choice.

The day was hosted by a very boisterous Celeste Barber, who honoured the volunteers in the house and couldn’t resist the odd political jibe. Russell Crowe-produced videos also drew attention to climate change concerns.

Both Seven and Foxtel produced their own hostings for the big day with Larry Emdur, Kylie Gillies, David Koch and Samantha Armytage for Seven with Sonia Kruger and Sam Mac backstage. A very late night for breakfast TV hosts.

Foxtel had Rove McManus, Matt Shirvington, Deborah Hutton, Jason Dundas and Hannah Hollis with crosses to Eddie McGuire & Shaynna Blaze at Federation Square in Melbourne. Both produced their own ‘magazine’ pieces highlighting communities, volunteers, wildlife and global reactions.

Sure there were some issues with sync on Foxtel’s 4K channel, and delays for Seven viewers outside AEDT states ….but these aside it was a fantastic broadcast.

$9.5m was also raised during the broadcast, expected to top $10m when final numbers are in.

Like Sound Relief following the Black Saturday bushfires in 2009, and a post-Tsunami telethon, Fire Fight Australia will go down as a day where the power of music brings hope and unites a nation in the face of mother nature’s ferocity.

24 Responses

  2. David why have you deleted the many comments about Celeste Barber’s screaming performance? The comments were a critique about her yelling, not about her as a person. There’s plenty of evidence of hosting styles being criticised previously on your blog. So why are you censoring them now?

    1. There was one I have removed due to the wording, there are still others that refer to it and hosting style. Site policy requires a degree of respect and in hindsight it should not have been approved. We’ve just seen somebody take their own life in the UK following social media comments. Moderation is certainly never easy but trust this gives added context.

      1. You’ve deleted more than one comment about her. Please point us to where the remaining comments are posted, because I can’t see a single comment remaining about her yelling. You think because people complained about her yelling that she’s at risk of committing suicide? That’s a far stretch. Are readers not allowed to comment on what they don’t like on your blog anymore?

        1. I removed 1 comment (and 1 complaint about it given it repeated it). Lyn’s comment below still refers to the yelling which is a fair criticism on hosting. There’s thousands -literally- of comments critical of content on the site and moderating comes with all kinds of pitfalls such as this. I’ve conceded it was an error on my part to publish the wording and I’ll cop it on the chin that I’m damned if I do publish / damned if I remove. With nearly 500,000 comments approved I hope I get moderating right more often than not, and take pride that TVT is not a site known for flaming wars etc. But your objection is duly noted nevertheless, thanks.

  3. I watched most of it. Loved it (even those I had no idea who they were! I’m that old!)
    I loved Daryl Braithwaite, Delta Goodrem, John Farnham & ONJ were wonderful!
    That version of “You’re The Voice” was the best I’ve ever seen! Absolutely Brilliant!
    My only complaint was the young lady hosting. Did she have to yell everytime she was on stage?
    I hope someone at 7 decides to release the cd/dvd of the whole 11hrs with more proceeds to the cause.

  4. Just loved it. Just watching fabulous acts after acts. Queen & Adam smashed it, Icehouse were awesome & the ending was just perfectly done.

    Well done to all involved

  6. Great day and night of entertainment.I watched it through Foxtel.Rove was back in his element chatting to the performers.Even Rohan Keating saying i have not seen you in years how are you.Foxtel certainly showed how to host a program an area Channel 7 lacks in.Well Done to everyone involved

    1. Agree with both of you @Morbo and @joely – she was soooo annoying!! I kept saying the same thing – “why are you screaming? you do have a microphone!”

  10. Yep fantastic show and I have to say for mine Alice Cooper stole the show, just gave his all and at 72 ( 4 x 18), the version of School’s Out was brilliant. Queen were fantastic however I kept thinking Freddy would have used the stage more and that runway that Adam didn’t much, I think it was because it was the Live Aid set and brought back memories of Freddy working that crowd (seeing him didn’t help).

    1. On a side note: I just remembered that it was 45 years ago this year on April 07th that the then Labor Government Immigration Minister Clyde Cameron banned Alice Cooper from touring here (the Welcome To My Nightmare Tour).

  11. A great show but why in 2020 do I have to watch on 7Plus in Brisbane to get a ‘live’ feed which ended up being on 60 second delay during prime time. Just not good enough.

  12. An outstanding and exceptional show! Great write up and photos David. Where was Men At Work, John Williamson and Powderfinger? Down Under, True Blue and My Happiness were great Aussie anthems missing.

  13. A massive shout-out to Gary Deans who directed the live performances. In the chair from before 1pm until after 10pm with just a single 10min break when they went to Michael Buble. He and his team put in a huge effort to bring the concert into our lounge rooms.

    1. Absolutely agree. Great job to Gary, all the camera operators, broadcast engineer’s, lighting and grips..
      Massive effort putting it all together and then having to derig it at the end of the night..

  14. It was a very well produced show, especially given the short turn around time after queen finished the night before. A fantastic mix of old and new musicians from different genres. Well done to all involved.

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