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The Times:
Most charity music is pontificating and self triumphant. I was going to dismiss HELP as being of this genre until I heard Suede was on it and it became a must-have. But I wasn't disappointed in any of the songs on the album. This is a ground breakingly good charity album and an excellent compilation containing 20 great tracks, the highlights being Suede and The Stone Roses and the artwork by the Roses' John Squire and Massive Attack's 3D. This is a brilliant album, regardless of its charity status. Peter Hully
The Sunday Telegraph:
Put aside all your preconceptions about charity albums - this record would be worth buying even if its profits weren't going towards Bosnian war victims. Though each of its tracks, by everyone from Blur and Oasis to Massive Attack and Orbital, was recorded in only a day, you'd rarely guess it from the quality of the material. How good it is to hear the Stone Roses, whose last album was five years in the making, jerked from their customary lassitude to such fine effect with their raw, bluesy version of Love Spreads. How amazing that Portishead, so reliant on time-consuming studio wizadry, could yet dash off a song as shimmeringly complex as Mourning Air (War Child). And what a relief to discover that Sinead O'Connor, whose magnificent cover of Bobby Gentry's Ode to Billy Joe vies with Radiohead's Lucky for best track, has not lost the plot completely. The many who rushed out to buy the album "blind", making it the fastest-selling LP of all time, are in for a very pleasant surprise.
Independent:
"I wouldn't have bought it if it was any old crap, but I'd probably still have bought it even if it wasn't for charity." One of the first in HMV music store on London's Oxford Street buying Help on Saturday morning. The album's instant success was always assured. Contributions from Blur, Noel Gallagher of Oasis, Paul Weller and other pop heavyweights affored it a credibility rare in a charity record.
But the album, like every Bosnian charity project, has faced some obstacles. Sympathy fatigue hampers all modern appeals, but the complexities of the Yugoslav conflict have strangled any earlier efforts to rouse a Band Aid-style momentum. After five years of conflict, Help is Bosnia's first mass media charity event. War Child, which provides medical relief and mobile bakeries in Bosnia, was on the verge of closure through lack of funds a year ago. Last year's joint Former Yugoslavia Appeal, a major effort involving high-profile agencies, scarcely raised one million pounds.
The Red Cross explained "We have to capitalise on times when the humanitarian crises are high profile. They are what people respond to. A major reason why Help has succeeded is because it was done quickly, before people forgot about the latest atrocities."
Rob Partridge, one of the organisers, added "It's not a begging bowl record. We want people to buy it because of it's own worth, not to make them feel better about themselves."
The path between offering a desirable commodity and appearing to profit from human misery, acknowledged Mr. Partridge, is a fine line for philanthropic pop stars to dance. "This is not the same concept as Live Aid," insisted Mr. Partridge. "This is not about appearing live on TV. There's going to be no big Wembley concert. We don't even have a photograph of the bands together."
Charities like War Child have clearly learned a lot of lessons since 1985. A svengali-like figure like Geldof has been conspicuously absent from this project and the album's strong emphasis on younger bands has helped deflect criticism.
Melody Maker:
HELP has raised more than 2 million pounds for Bosnian children and Go! Discs are now asking the UK Government to help out by waiving the VAT on the album. Tony Crean, who dreamed up the concept of HELP and was one of the main organisers of the project, said "Right from day one we've been asking everybody to do everything for zero profit and we're continuing to do so. Our biggest challenge now is to persuade the Government to waive the VAT, which amounts to about two pounds per album. After all, there's no money coming to Go! Discs from the album and almost everybody concerned has been working for free. If the Government would join in that spirit, it would make a lot of difference."
Asked about newspaper reports that some retail chains were refusing to donate their profits from the record to War Child - "We are trying to encourage some of the shops to increase their donations, but even those that haven't sold the record for no profit have given lots of support in terms of in-store plays and free window displays, which normally you'd have to pay tens of thousands for. Obviously, that helps."
Go! Discs MD Andy Macdonald has written to retailers asking them to 'view their support of this record as a zero-profit exercise', although he has also stressed he is not criticising the record shops. "They have been amazing. One chain has contributed a marketing campaign which, if it had been initiated by the record company, would have cost thousands."
Woolworths, Tower Records and Rough Trade shops are selling the album at cost price and taking no profit. Our Price have claimed that more money will go to the charity from sales in their shops than from those in HMV shops. HMV have donated window displays and advertising material.
Music Week:
Despite his disappointment that HELP was not included in the artist albums chart, Go! Discs MD Andy Macdonald says the impetus has now got to be maintained to keep HELP in the news. "So far the money raised from video sales, international TV rights, early shipments abroad and what we have sold to the trade has been fantastic.It really is such a strong record. It is the one essential album of the year and gives snapshots of the best of British acts at their peak," he says.
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