LIVE 8: I LOVE A PROTEST WITH A HAPPY ATMOSPHERE

Although the line-up is almost disconcertingly ropey in places, there feels to be a slightly better atmosphere with this concert - it seems to be more aware of what it's supposed to be doing, and not losing sight of what the business at hand is meant to be. Which might come from not having people in the front row who paid a grand to be there.

Annie Lennox seems a lot more comfortable doing Redemption Song at a teeny tiny keyboard than she did doing the whole "why" bit on Saturday (although she seems to be fighting the urge to do a cod-Jamaican accent); Sharleen Spitteri seemed to struggle her way around Say What You Want so much the BBC coverage appeared to give up and cut away to an interview with George Clooney. Midge Ure came across as passionate and a lot less messianistic than his mate. And if the appearance of most of Pink Floyd on the same stage was surprising, that was nothing to seeing all of the Sugababes on the same stage at the same time.

Oh, hang about, Annie Lennox seems to have started doing Sisters Are Doing It For Themselves - we'd like to think this is being meant as a tart observation on the way "eight men" are going to decide the futures of all of the rest of us, but we think it might just have been heeding the 'do the hits' rule.

We could have done without Bono, mind, coming on with a back to front baseball cap and a small box with everyone's names in; whatever his message was meant to be got more than a little lost in his clear desire to point out that he'd actually been to Gleneagles, where all the famous politicians and rich men were. He waved the box of names around, and insisted that it was the greatest mandate in the history of man - maybe, Bono, but I don't remember anyone being told that we were voting for you to be our representative at the top table...

Annie Lennox is just launching into a speech which is pretty impassioned, and much more sharply political than anything from the weekend - demanding rather than requesting; not hedging around the issue but insisting on change. It'd be hard to confuse tonight with just a rock concert.

music annie lennox bono live 8 live8