Tonight saw the benefit of all Haiti benefits take over the airwaves of virtually every television channel — aside from Fox News. Celebrities were rampant for “Hope for Haiti” as were musicians, all with the intention of inspiring folks to donate a few bucks to their brethren in the disaster-ridden country. When it comes to the latter, their were many highlights — Springsteen performing “We Shall Overcome”, Jennifer Hudson tackling “Let it Be”, and Dave Matthews joining Neil Young for “Alone and Forsaken” are a few examples. But easily the exciting of them all was the much-anticipated collaboration between U2 and Jay-Z.
As it so turns out, the track, titled “Stranded (Haiti Mon Amour)”, also features Rihanna, primarily hears Hova in command, and, in the end, it totally lives up to the expectations! Lyrically, the selection is emotionally raw, musically, it’s incredibly catchy. Overall, it’s a song of hope that is neither too cheesy, nor full of itself — it’s “Stranded (Haiti Mon Amour)” that does the talking, not its massive star power.
The song, as well as the rest of the benefit’s musical performances, will be packaged together on the digital only album Hope for Haiti Now. It will be available starting January 25th via iTunes, and 100% of proceeds from the sale of album and any of its individual live performance tracks will go to Clinton Bush Haiti Fund, Oxfam America, Partners In Health, Red Cross, UNICEF, United Nations World Food Programme, and Yéle Haiti Foundation.
