Following the reveal that the music industry’s biggest names would be uniting to remake Band Aid’s classic “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” earlier this month, the highly publicized track dropped officially on Monday.
Featuring the vocals of Bono, One Direction, Rita Ora, Ed Sheeran and many more, the holiday single is currently available on iTunes with proceeds going toward the fight against Ebola. Sam Smith, Ellie Goulding and Coldplay’s Chris Martin were also among the contributors.
Bob Geldof, the singer-songwriter who was heavily involved with the 1984 original, organized the revamp. And while the focus of the recording 30 years ago was to tackle famine in Ethiopia, Geldof reminded the artists of the 2014 collaboration that the world faces an even greater challenge now.
“Bob gave a really touching speech before we started singing, so I think that really got everybody in the mind frame that we needed to be in to remind us it’s fun but we’re here for a really serious reason,” said UK-based artist Emeli Sandé. “It was him expressing how passionate he was about this cause and how it’s so unnecessary that so many people should be dying.”
Check out the updated song in the video above.