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DEC 27, 2002

Still keeping the faith

Bon Jovi will celebrate its 20th anniversary next year. While the boys claim to have mellowed over the years, age does not mean they have slowed down

By Valerie Khoo

MOST buskers are grateful for a small audience and a few coins in change.

While these wannabe musicians offer a free performance to anyone who cares to listen, few attract the kind of crowd that assembled last week when Bon Jovi held an impromptu afternoon concert at Sydney's Darling Harbour.

By the end of their half-hour set, 15,000 people had turned up to listen to the free acoustic performance which served as an appetiser to the following night's stadium gig.

With a stage set on a floating barge against the backdrop of Sydney Harbour, one over-zealous fan dived into the water in an attempt to get closer to his idols.

It's this kind of commitment from fans that sees Bon Jovi sell out stadiums all over the world. Now preparing for their world tour, the band members have been busy visiting cities across the globe promoting their new album, Bounce.

Sitting in their Sydney hotel, lead singer Jon Bon Jovi, guitarist Richie Sambora, keyboardist David Bryan and drummer Tico Torres are used to the hype and the hectic schedule.

After more than 2,000 concerts and 92 million albums sold in their career so far, the band will celebrate 20 years together next year.

It's been a long road since its first 1993 hit, Runaway. Bounce is the band's eighth studio album, part of a discography that includes milestone albums such as Slippery When Wet (1986), Keep The Faith (1992) and Crush (2000).

Released five years after their previous album, These Days (1995), Crush sealed their longevity as veteran rockers but also propelled them towards a whole new audience.

The album's infectious first single, It's My Life, became an anthem for everyone from politicians and sports people to a fresh batch of youth.

'We had kids that heard Crush and the single, It's My Life, and they found a band that they thought was new,' says Bon Jovi.

'They tell their friends or older cousins who then say, 'Let me show you the other albums' and they discover our catalogue.'

The new album, Bounce, was written in the aftermath of the Sept 11 attacks on New York's World Trade Center. Exactly one year after the calamitous events, the band released it in Japan. It is an album that comments on the tragedy but is at the same time steeped with optimism for the future.

'We needed to make sure we were pointed in our lyrics,' says Bon Jovi. 'Bounce wasn't going to be a collection of pop songs; it was going to have songs of social merit. The way that Keep The Faith was influenced by the riots in LA, Bounce's first single, Everyday, was influenced by the Sept 11 tragedies.'

The band members describe Bon Jovi's music as 'optimistic rock and roll' and the band's lyrics have always echoed working-class towns, brotherly camaraderie and the nomadic lifestyle of the open road.

Nevertheless, Bounce also features songs influenced by unexpected sources. Hook Me Up was inspired by a newspaper article about a young Palestinian man desperately trying to make contact with the outside world through an old ham radio.

Juxtaposed next to this, however, is the album's second single, Misunderstood. 'It's a fun, tongue-in-cheek song for all the guys who've opened their mouth and inserted their feet,' says Bon Jovi.

His lyrics have even pervaded the big screen. In About A Boy, starring Hugh Grant, lyrics from his solo album, Blaze Of Glory (1990) were quoted at the beginning and end of the film.

'I had no idea that was going to be in the movie,' he says, clearly pleased by his unwitting inclusion in the hit film.

'When I saw the movie, that was the first I heard of it. Suddenly the screen was saying, 'Jon Bon Jovi said ...'. It was pretty cool.'

No stranger to the big screen himself, Bon Jovi has also carved a second career as an actor, most recently in nine episodes of Ally McBeal as her love interest.

At 40, he still has pin-up looks and it's hard to believe that he's been in the industry for two decades.

The tight-knit foursome began life as a group of five musicians, but bass player Alex John Such left the group in the mid-1990s.

Although the band then recruited long-time associate Hugh McDonald to play bass, he is still not officially part of Bon Jovi and does not take part in photos or interviews despite touring with them and playing on all the albums.

'Alex was part of the band from the inception,' says drummer Torres. 'He wanted to retire and at the end of the day, that's okay. Bill Wyman did that with the Stones. We got a great bass player, Hugh McDonald, just like the Stones got Ron Wood.

'It's hard to say you're a member of the band when you haven't gone through the pains from the start. I think it took Ron Wood 14 years to officially become part of the Stones and before he took pictures with them. So it's not outruled, but that's the reason.'

The phenomenal success of the band so early in its career fuelled rumours of a lifestyle full of sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll.

'There certainly was a time,' says Bon Jovi wistfully. 'But now instead of cheap beer, it's good wine. That's about the size of it. It's what you make of it, you can go out and get into trouble and do all the goofy kid stuff. But you don't have to either. Believe me, we've had our share of aspirin in the morning and then you go, 'It wasn't really worth it'.'

http://straitstimes.asia1.com.sg/lif...62753,00.html?