Culture of the United Kingdom music of Christmas has always been a combination of sacred and secular, and every year in the UK there is highly publicised competition to be the Christmas number one single, which has led to the production of music which provides the mainstay of festive playlists. Responding to a BBC report on the 1984 famine in Ethiopia, Bob Geldof created the charity supergroup Band Aid who recorded "Do They Know It's Christmas?". It has been Christmas number one three times. Written by Sarah Flower Adams in 1841, the Christian hymn "Nearer, My God, to Thee" is associated with the sinking of
Band Aid 20 was reached after a few days, enabling UK users to download the song at the standard iTunes price, with Apple donating an extra amount (equivalent to the price difference) to the Band Aid Trust. The single sold 72,000 copies in the first 24 hours when it was released on 29 November 2004, and went straight in at No. 1 in the UK Singles Chart on 5 December 2004. The CD version sold over 200,000 copies in the first week and was the fastest-selling single of the year. It stayed at No. 1 for Christmas and the week after, a total