[Becky]

Deja vu, anyone? This article was just posted 5 hours ago, but it's so similar to one posted before I thought twice about copying it here. LOL

Becky




Most of its '80s hair-band contemporaries have been relegated to used-CD bins, but somehow Bon Jovi is still selling out arenas and achieving multiplatinum record sales.

Although popular music has changed dramatically since Bon Jovi got together 20 years ago, the band's approach hasn't. Jon Bon Jovi, Richie Sambora, David Bryan, Tico Torres and Hugh McDonald are still playing anthemic ballads and boisterous rockers — catchy and melodic, if not enduringly memorable. So what's their secret?

"If you could bottle it, I think everybody would be doing it," Sambora says by phone on a tour stop in Minneapolis.

"I think No. 1, Jon and I really have a knack for writing songs that people can really relate to. People around the world relate, and we're still relevant in the marketplace."

People definitely relate. As the pop-metal flip side to Bruce Springsteen's rock 'n' roll tributes to working-class heroes, New Jersey-based Bon Jovi conveys similar sentiments. The protagonists in Bon Jovi songs are instantly sympathetic, and they have a universality that attracts fans who can see themselves in, for example, Tommy and Gina's in-love-but-broke predicament in "Livin' On a Prayer."

"I think people relate to the lyrics of the songs. I mean, 'It's My Life,' everybody made that into their theme song," Sambora says.

The songs may hook 'em, but it's the live shows that keep fans coming back; expect plenty of die-hards when the band returns to Denver to play the Pepsi Center on Thursday. Alternative rock act the Goo Goo Dolls opens the show.

"Our touring business has always been a big, big part of what we do," Sambora says. "So we have a very, very loyal fan base that has been coming to see us for a long, long time and we're very loyal to it. We're actually selling out stadiums. The arenas are the small gigs."

Still, even the most loyal fan base erodes over time if there's nothing new to hold its interest. The Scorpions and Whitesnake, for example, are co-headlining a theater tour, although both bands have sold out stadiums in the past, while Skid Row and former Motley Crue front man Vince Neil are hitting the club circuit. Bon Jovi has been careful to keep the group visible, most recently in a TV ad for Target. To help promote the band's latest album, last year's Bounce, Bon Jovi is offering a limited-edition CD of eight new songs exclusively in Target stores.

"I thought that was great; that's a real exciting thing. Now, with the problem in our industry of piracy and also all the downloading for free, you have to do everything you possibly can to be visible out there," Sambora says. "That just seemed like a really cool idea, judging the by people who have done it before. Macy Gray did it before, U2 did it before, very, very successfully."

Recorded after Jon Bon Jovi did an acting stint on the hit TV show "Ally McBeal," Bounce has sold more than 500,000 copies since October, but that's paltry by Bon Jovi standards. The group's 1986 album Slippery When Wet hit No. 1 on the Billboard chart and has sold more than 12 million copies. Even so, the band is pleased with Bounce and the air of optimism it projects — something that was important to the group after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Three of the 12 tracks are specifically about 9/11, and Sambora says the attacks colored the album as a whole.

"Jon and I were in the middle of it. I had left the city the day before to go to Jon's house to continue our writing process. I could see the Trade Center from Jon's back yard, for God's sakes," Sambora says.

After writing seven or eight Sept. 11-related tunes, Bon Jovi and Sambora decided to include only a few on the album.

"We said, 'We've got to make a more optimistic record,'" Sambora says. "I mean, 'Everyday' was affected by 9/11 in a way where, it's a song that says, 'Hey, man, I'm not here to play. I'm going to live my life everyday.' ... The threads of optimism have always been a part of the fabric of our lyrics."

That seize-the-day attitude has carried over into the current tour, which runs through the summer. Sambora says the show features the biggest stage setup yet. He wouldn't say much about the performance itself, except that he and the band are working hard and having fun.

"Right now, we're in the thick of it. This is really what we're thinking about right now, being great every night," Sambora says. "We're playing a lot of stuff off the new record and it's going over like gangbusters, and all the hits you want to hear, man."