View Single Post
 
Old 10-06-2018, 07:48 PM
JackieBlue JackieBlue is offline
Senior Member
These Days
 
Join Date: 22 May 2013
Gender: female
Posts: 2,557
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by semigoodlooking View Post
You're right obviously, but wasn't the fanclub set up by Jon's mother? I guess she set it up specifically for him and it just grew. Either way, there's no reason why the name could not have changed at some point.

And (I am thinking as I am writing), it's also his band so it is what it is. Bon Jovi has always been JBJ and co., even back in the 80s when we like to think they were a band of brothers. Jon has always pushed it was a band, but it is almost always been "Bon Jovi is a band... but".
IIRC, the story goes that it was originally started by the mothers of all 5 members of the band and was called the Bon Jovi fan club or "Jersey Syndicate" or something like that. Then at some point Jon's mother felt like the others weren't contributing information for the communications from the fan club, so she changed it to BSWJBJ.

I don't know when that happened; but I would suspect that it probably started changing sometime around KTF, or shortly thereafter. I didn't follow them in the back in the 80s, but just from interviews and shows, I think they really were more like a "band of brothers" and were closer to functioning as equals. Even if it was Jon's name on the contract, there still seemed to be a "gang" mentality when they recorded and toured NJ. But when things headed south as the NJ tour wound down, it seems like that dynamic started changing. Jon fired Doc and took over managing the band himself, and by the time they recorded KTF, it was all about Jon's vision; and he was clearly calling the shots. Or that's what Bob Rock said, anyway, about the difference he observed between the way they were when they did NJ vs what it was like when they recorded KTF. And I believe Jon supports that statement because, if I'm not mistaken, he is the one who said that after the sessions with Lou Cox they all agreed to follow his vision. I don't doubt that they all agreed; I'm just not sure that at that time, any of them - including Jon - realized how far into I-me-mine territory it was eventually going to go.

Others who were fans back then may see it differently, and could probably shed more light on the subject; but that's how it looks, in retrospect, from a spectator's seat.
Reply With Quote