Music's top acts ready to rock Sandy benefit concert

The Rolling Stones, Bruce Springsteen and Kanye West are some of the acts that will be playing at Madison Square Garden Wednesday night for a benefit concert to help Superstorm Sandy victims.

The sold-out "12-12-12" concert is being shown on 37 television stations in the United States and more than 200 others worldwide. It will be streamed on 30 websites, including on YouTube and Yahoo, and played on radio stations. Theaters, including 27 in the New York region and dozens more elsewhere, will also show it live. More than two billion people are expected to have access to the performance.

Concert performers Bruce Springsteen and Bon Jovi are native sons of New Jersey, where boardwalks and beach homes were ripped apart. Long Islander Billy Joel ("New York State of Mind") and New Yorker Alicia Keys ("Empire State of Mind") have signature songs about the city. Even Liverpool's Paul McCartney has a New York office, Hamptons home and a wife, Nancy Shevell, who spent a decade on the board of the agency that runs New York's public transit system.

Mick Jagger of the Rolling Stones wasn't in New York for the storm but has an apartment in the city that was flooded with some two feet of water, he said.

"Imagine you hadn't known it was coming," he said in an interview. "It would have been pretty dire. I think it's good to do events to support people in the area where you're very familiar with. I mean, I've been coming here for a long time."

Other artists expected to perform include Eric Clapton, Dave Grohl, Chris Martin, Roger Waters, Eddie Vedder and the Who.

Celebrities like Jimmy Fallon, Adam Sandler, Jon Stewart, Sean Combs, Leonardo DiCaprio and Brian Williams will also be on hand to tell stories about the storm and take pledges for donations.

Proceeds from the show will be distributed through the Robin Hood Foundation.