http://www.geocities.com/SunsetStrip...re/3073/td.htm
This text and the pictures are taken from the "These Days" promotion booklet that is sent to radio- stations along with the CD so the radio guys have something to say & quote before the song comes.
"I think it's a continuation of a band on a journey. No one knows where that journey's end up, but I know that we're not going backwards." That's how singer Jon Bon Jovi describes his band's first studio album in three years, These Days. It's an album that finds the members of Bon Jovi - Jon, guitarist Richie Sambora, keyboard player David Bryan, and drummer Tico Torres - drawing on roots that were planted and bands that were formed twelve years ago, when they came together as a group. But as its title, and Jon's words, suggest, These Days is nobody's nostalgia trip. Its heart lies decidedly in the present, and its vision extends well beyond that.
Bon Jovi's history is, of course, familiar to any rock fan who hasn't been living in a closet for the past decade. In bried, a few Jersey-based musicians build a local following with radiantly charismatic live shows, then came to national attention with the single Runaway, then conquer the world with two of the most successful albums of the late eighties: Slippery When Wet and New Jersey. A Period of re-assessment follows, allowing for solo projects and eventually producing Keep The Faith, and experimental album that finds the band breaking new ground musically and thematically. Looking back now, Jon says, "we've been through everything and back again together, and we've always had that kind of us-against-the-world feeling about what it meant to be in a band."
Lately the world seems to be under Bon Jovi's thumb once again. 1994 brought the release of Cross Road, a greatest hits collection that would re-establish the group among the rock's top international acts. Cross Road also went on to sell over 12 million copies worldwide and yield a new smash single Always. This time around, though, the guys are taking their triumph in stride. "You can't measure thtings in terms of commercial success" Jon stresses. "We've had huge records, and we've had records that weren't huge. As long as I was happy with 'em, I didn't care. I'm really pleased with the greates hits album was so big; that does feel good. But what matters is whether we like the songs, and whether the people who listen to them like them."
With These Days, Bon Jovi is getting back to these basics, even as it moves forward. "We returned to being what we always aimed to be - a fun rock band." This renewed sense of excitement and camaraderie is immedately apparent in the playing - in the supple exuberance of Richie's work on guitar and sitar, or the way that David's piano and synth nuances complement Tico's crisp, muscular percussion.
That's not to say that the new album is all fun and games. While rediscovering the joy of working together, the bandmates - particulary Jon and Richie, who wrote the songs, have not shied away from sometimes troubling social and personal issues. The title track conveys a similar world-weariness. "These days - the stars seem out of reach" Jon sings, over an arrangement full of bittersweet yearning. "Nothing lasts in this graceless age." Even some of the love songs have titles that suggest fear and ambivalence: Lie To Me, Damned, Something For The Pain.
Darker sentiments like these don't indicate a failure to keep the faith; rather, they point out how difficult it often is to do so - and how challenging it can be to sum up life's complications in the course of a few verses. As Jon says, "You have to fit your thoughts and emotions into the confines of a four-minute song. Like anything else, the more you do it, hopefully, the better you become at it."
The lyrics on These Days reveal a maturity and clarity that only experience can bring, whether acknowledging painful truths - "I should have listened when you said good night / You really meant goodbye" goes a line from This Ain't A Love Song - or expressing wistful longing, as Jon does on Lie To Me with the simple words, "I know I can't lose me / Cause then I'd be losing you." Jon says, "My world has grown since 1983, when I first got signed. And when I'm writing, I try to reflect that."
Another factor in Bon Jovi's growth has been a couple of happy personal developments. Since Keep The Faith was released, Jon and his wife Dorothea have become the proud parents of two children, and Richie recentely married actress Heather Locklear. for his part, Jon says, "Being a father hasn't affected me in a way where I'm writing baby songs. But it's affected my life in a great way. You know, we learns so much about love from kids, it's amazing." Keyboardist David Bryan also became a father last year when his wife gave birth to twins, and drummer Tico Torres, also an accomplished painter and pilot, became engaged this year to model Eva Herzigova.
There's also been somethting of a revival of family values within the group itself. "When I put the band together" says Jon, "it was around my songs and a record deal that I already had; but I never wanted it to be jon Bon Jovi and, oh yeah, those guys."
These Days finds Jon and Richie sharing writing duties, as they did in the late eighties, with all four founding band members (original bassist Alec John Such left amicably last year, and is replaced on the album by sessions man Hugh McDonald) contributing a lot to the album. "This has been a real "we" project" Jon insists.
And the results are clearly a credit to all involved. produced by Peter Collins in collaboration with Jon and Richie, These Days offsets classic power ballads like This Ain't A Love Song with bluesy rockers like Hearts Breaking Even and moody, haunting numbers such as My guitar Lies Bleeding In My Arms with funky surprises like the crackling, hip-hop-laced Damned. The arrangements are Bon Jovi's most intricate and adventurous to date, featuring gorgeous washes of strings (orchestrated by David Campbell) and neo-psychedelic sitar riffs. But there are also moments of stunning simplicity, like the closing track Dimaond Ring, and eerily beautiful acoustic ballad fueled by graceful wisps of piano and guitar.
Starting in the spring of '95, the band is embarking on a massive worldwide tour, in which they'll perform primarily at stadiums. "The idea was that there's one or two countries in the world that we've never been to. India's one of 'em, so we're starting in Bombay. After eight or nine shows in the Pacific Rim, we'll go to Japan, then Europe, then to the U.S. and throughout North America, then to South America, Australia, New Zealand. So we'll cover some forty-odd countries." (In August, while they're still on the road, Jon will make his film debut in Moonlight And Valentino, a fact-based romance scripted by Ellen Simon - Neil's daughter - and costarring Whoopi Goldberg, Kathleen Turner, Elizabeth Perkins, and Gwyneth Paltrow.) Still, the pace will be a reasonable one, as it was for the Keep The Faith tour. "Pacing is key to touring" Jon emphasizes. "As long as you're having fun physically and mentally, you stay. if not, you go home."
Which brings Jon back to his original point, about what keeps Bon Jovi going strong dozen years down the line. "At a time when music has become such a business, we just want it to be fun again. We're the band next door that practiced in a garage, but that twelve years later plays really big garages, you know?" These Days, that's a refreshing approach to rock & roll.
11-30-2003, 09:53 PM
Don't worry, it was only a joke... Um, you might want to ask some BIG These Days fans. I don't know of any sites, but what class is the project for?
