Bon Jovi: Bon Jovi's bad medicine good for Edmonton

Another day, another Bon Jovi concert review.  But at least the reviewer isn't snarky and mean and wishing he or she was at some Hipster band's concert.

Bon Jovi's bad medicine good for Edmonton

BY ELIZABETH WITHEY, EDMONTONJOURNAL.COM JULY 16, 2010

 

Bon Jovi performs at Commonwealth Stadium in Edmonton July 15, 2010

Photograph by: Larry Wong/Edmonton Journal, edmontonjournal.com

EDMONTON — As soon as I heard the chorus of Bed of Roses, I was back at the school dance in Grade 10, a hormonal, desperate dreamer singing along while watching the cool kids slow-dance, ever hopeful some hunk might someday be willing to sleep on a bed of nails in my honour.

Yup. Bon Jovi can still pound a Prairie girl’s heart into mawkish mush.

Twas the perfect night for an outdoor trip down rock memory lane at Commonwealth Stadium: clear skies, just a sliver of moon, no coat required.

The epic rock band came on as the sun set and wouldn’t stop playing until after Cinderella’s bedtime, giving the sold-out crowd of more than 40,000 a serious hit of bad medicine.

“I’m just gettin’ warmed up,” frontman Jon Bon Jovi shouted after 40 minutes. The set, well over two hours, was everything fans could hope for: all the classics (and there are a LOT of classics), video bling and plenty of close-ups of the lead singer. He’s still got it, that Jonny: the voice, the hair, that sweaty V-neck sex appeal that makes an otherwise sensible woman want to pounce and paw. Not bad for a 48-year-old father of four who’s currently suffering from a torn calf muscle. Jon injured himself at a show last Friday in New Jersey; his stage movement was noticeably limited but he grooved as best he could, punching the air and doing one-legged hops while tossing self-deprecating comments to the audience.

“You got another leg?” he asked the band. “I could use one.”

Jutting out from the stage was a raised walkway making a half-circle into the crowd, with some lucky ticket holders tucked in the middle. Jon couldn’t prowl back and forth on the walkway but he sneakily hobbled out to the front of it while guitarist Richie Sambora sang Lay Your Hands on Me.

“I like the view out here,” Jon said. “Not easy to get here but it was worth the trip.”

Support act Kid Rock got the rowdy crowd riled and gave them plenty of time to tank up on beer with an hour-long set. Fans sang along with All Summer Long and I Put Your Picture Away as the rockin’-rappin’ renegade monkeyed around on stage, standing above a turntable and playing it through his legs while smoking a cigar.

“Woooooh!” he shouted. “That’s the redneck mating call.” The gel-nailed, handlebar-mustachioed masses hollered back.

But it was Bon Jovi they’d come for. Like kittens at a bowl of milk, they lapped up Jon’s bad-boy grin and husky sound as he belted out one anthemic hit after another: You Give Love a Bad Name, Dead or Alive, Livin’ on a Prayer. And I couldn’t help but appreciate his passion performing I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead — clearly, he means what he sings.

The Bon Jovi posse may be jowlier and wrinklier but their energy Thursday was unfaltering — Sambora was unstoppable, burning up yet chilled out, chewing gum the entire show while singing backup vocals, and drummer Tico Torres bashed out beats in a perspiration-soaked frenzy. Keyboardist David Bryan’s frizzy mop is so dated yet I’m not sure I’d want it any other way. The collective wildness quelled my cynicism about vintage bands touring for the money.

These guys still love what they do.

ewithey@thejournal.canwest.com

Kid Rock is like not the best looking man in Rock N Roll, he's not the worst either, of course the ugliest man in Rock in Chad Kroger from Nickleback.  When God handed out Rock Star Pretty of course Jon was at the front of the line and by the time Chad got there (hell, even if he had been second in line) God let him know, 'Oops, sorry all out..." (I'm not insulting Nickleback as a band like some people do, I like their music, but Chad to me is U-G-L-Y).

Bon Jovi - Most romantic wedding chapels in Las Vegas, NV

Here's a little something that popped in my Google Alerts.

"Graceland Chapel" is located at 619 Las Vegas Boulevard and has been officiating weddings for over 50 years. Famous couples such as Jon and Dorothea Bon Jovi, Billy Ray and Tish Cyrus, and Blaine and Robert Trump all pledged their love for one another at the ever popular "Graceland Chapel."

Couples are offered a full service wedding facility with fresh or lifelike flowers, videography, photography, limousine service, and so much more.

Wedding packages start at only $199.00 and can be seen on line atwww.gracelandchapel.com.

Source

I have been to the Graceland Wedding Chapel, inside it too, not for a wedding either.  About 10 years ago.  And for those of you wondering No I did not cry.  But I did get a copy of Jon & Dorothea's Marriage license (no I am not a stalker, it was given to me).

Here are some pictures I took.

Bon Jovi: Bon Jovi doesn't let injury hamper Calgary concert (w/Pictures)

Bon Jovi doesn't let injury hamper Calgary concert

Wounded rocker's vocals right on the money for sold out crowd

BY HEATH MCCOY, CALGARY HERALD JULY 15, 2010

Jon Bon Jovi in a Calgary Stampede performance at the Pengrowth Saddledome.

Photograph by: Stuart Gradon, Calgary Herald

See the photo gallery of Bon Jovi's sold-out Calgary Stampede performance

Whether you're a devoted member of the Bon Jovi fan club, or, you're more apt to goof on the band, hard rock-lite heartthrobs that they are, you have to give a hard working rocker like Jon Bon Jovi credit where it's due.

The man has always given the impression that he's knocking himself out for the fans when he's standing on the stage fronting the band that is his namesake.

He even powers through painful injuries suffered on the job, like the calf muscle he blew out during Bon Jovi's Friday night gig in his hometown of New Jersey.

That's the sort of thing that's been known to put many a pampered rock star out of commission for a bit of a bed and beauty rest and time to lick the wounds.

Not so for this 48-year-old rocker who brought his band to Saddledome Wednesday night for a Calgary Stampede gig.

Like Bon Jovi keyboardist David Bryan said in an interview before the concert: “He's our race horse,” and that race horse put on an impressive showing at the 'Dome in a sold out gig that went on for a good two-and-a-half hours.

Hitting the stage with Blood on Blood it was clear the singer was working through an injury in that he favoured his strong leg and he wasn't quite as rambunctious as he can be.

He acknowledged as much too, rewriting a line from Blood On Blood as “me, I'm the one-legged singer in a long-haired rock 'n roll band.”

But he didn't let it slow him down – much. During hit songs like You Give Love A Bad Name, Born To Be My Baby and It's My Life he actually pogoed and broke out a few moves on that one leg, and he didn't look all that silly doing it either.

In fact, to the many ladies in the audience who came to drool at the guy, he looked fine. Was that a squeal I just heard? Mighty fine, I suppose.

Unlike so many classic rock bands, Bon Jovi is able to push its new tunes on the audience as well, without losing momentum.

That was clear during songs like We Weren't Born To Follow, Work For The Working Man and the band's foray into contemporary country rock, Who Says You Can't Go Home?

A huge part of the show's success was down to the band, who played it loose but with real authority, guitarist Richie Sambora and drummer Tico Torres driving the sound.

As for our wounded hero, his vocals were right on the money, warm, raspy and soulful, and throughout the evening he emitted the charisma of man who had something to prove.

One of the highlights in that proving was a version of the '80s hit Bad Medicine, which incorporated bits of Roy Orbison's Pretty Woman. It brought the roof down.

At press time the encore had begun and Jon limped up to the mic leading his band through an excellent version of Wanted Dead Or Alive.

The fans, of course, loved the show, but even Bon Jovi's detractors would be jerks not to admit that the band with the beat-up frontman won the fight on Wednesday night.

– hmccoy@theherald.canwest.com

Bon Jovi: Jon Bon Jovi: He’ll be there for you

 Martyr, that's all I'm going to say.  And if he keeps it up he will die on stage, by a runaway ducky boat.  And the number at the bottom!!  97 Songs have been programmed.  so we should see more than 1 or 2 song changes a night then Jon!

Jon Bon Jovi: He’ll be there for you

Almost 25 years after his band hit it big, the rock star tells the Star his first responsibility is to his fans

Published On Fri Jul 16 2010

Jon Bon Jovi is only 48, but he told the Star's Richard Ouzounian when he goes, he'd prefer to die onstage.

KEVIN MAZUR/WIREIMAGE FOR AEG

By Richard Ouzounian

Theatre Critic

The Jon Bon Jovi who’s playing the Rogers Centre on July 20-21 has learned a lot in the quarter-century he’s been fronting one of the most popular bands in modern musical history.

Or maybe he hasn’t.

“In the early days, I thought I had to be the one who cut the vein open and bled on the stage or the audience wouldn’t come back. I don’t do that anymore.”

But less than a week after telling me that in an interview, he got so carried away during a concert on home turf at the Meadowlands Stadium in New Jersey that he tore a calf muscle and had to finish the evening in visible pain.

“My first responsibility is to my fans. I never want to disappoint them,” he insists, and so, on July 10, he kept on singing the anthemic “Livin’ on a Prayer,” including its lyric that could define this driven artist’s relationship with his public.

“We’ve got each other and that’s a lot.”

Rock ’n’ roll is an art form built on excess and Bon Jovi’s success has been no exception to that rule.

But he’s never been connected to the worlds of sex and drugs. For him, the music has always been enough.

“I think I realized early on that ‘beat the devil’ wasn’t that great a game to play. That stuff just wasn’t inside me. Heroin never appealed to me.”

That doesn’t mean he didn’t have his own addictions.

“Driving my voice was always my demon, my dark thing, even if it was a product of innocence,” he recalls. “I don’t blame the record companies and the promoters for pushing me. They were taking every opportunity instead of seeking out the best ones.

“They went for ‘get while the getting’s good’ and when you’re 25, you say, ‘That’s cool, man, let’s go for it.’ If I was a victim, I was a willing one.”

Right after they hit it really big in 1986 with their third album, Slippery When Wet, they went on an exhausting world tour where Bon Jovi kept straining his voice to the max every night.

“People would come to see us just to hear if I was going to make it through each show,” he remembers. “You know, just like they’d show up to watch someone really wired on booze or drugs have a total burnout, they came to watch me trash my voice. And I kept doing it.”

Bon Jovi later admitted he received steroid treatment during this period to keep singing every night but denied there was any lasting damage to his vocal chords.

Still, after another brutal world tour in support of 1988’s New Jersey album, he realized some changes had to be made.

“As a kid, you’re out there trying to establish a foundation for your career. You want to do everything you can, be all things to all people and so you just look at your life in the short term.

“But once you stop, pull back and look at what you’ve been doing, you can really scare yourself.”

In Bon Jovi’s case, he married his high school sweetheart, Dorothea Hurley, in 1989. They had four kids and are still a solid couple, a rarity in his business.

He attributes his ultimate stability, as well as that of the other members of the group, to the fact they never betrayed their New Jersey roots.

“It was great that we lived in the shadow of New York City, out there in the burbs. There weren’t any Joneses for us to keep up with it. Getting a lot of stuff didn’t mean anything in my ’hood when you were growing up. Getting to age 18 alive and in one piece meant a lot more.”

He also feels that the circumstances under which Bon Jovi came to fruition aren’t likely to be repeated.

“We were in a time and place that a band could cut their teeth without everybody watching your every move. You could even make a couple of albums without a record company deciding what you had to sing.

“I’m not knocking any artists today, but I just don’t think another band could come along in 2010 with the music business being what it is now and sell 120 million albums or perform to two million people. “

Something else that Bon Jovi feels has helped his stability in the long run is the philanthropic work he’s engaged in for the past decade. His name has been linked with activities for the Special Olympics, the Red Cross, Habitat for Humanity and many others.

Currently, he’s most heavily involved with the Philadelphia Soul Charitable Foundation, rehabilitating a block of 15 homes in that city.

“When you’re a little kid, you see all the bad things in the world and promise you’re going to fix them one day, but then you forget about all it,” he says. “Back when I was 20, it wasn’t the first or even the 10th thing on my mind.

“But when I hit 40, I started looking for something more in my life. Something to believe in. I was raised Catholic, but I have a lot of issues with what’s gone on in that Church. I’m heartbroken by it. The way I was raised was regimented by fear. Eat meat on Friday and you go to hell. What does a kid learn from that?

“You’ve got to find your spirituality wherever you can. I found it in good deeds. The greatest reward I have in my life is putting a roof over someone’s head and handing them the keys when they never thought they’d have a place of their own.”

All of this, however, doesn’t mean that rock ’n’ roll has ceased to be a powerful part of Bon Jovi’s life equation.

“Someone asked me what song we’re opening with on this tour and I told him, ‘We’ve got 70 songs and it could be a different one every night.’ You start with how you feel. Can you hit the big notes that night? Then you go on to what moves you emotionally. How do I feel today? That provides the spark that lights the fire.”

Retirement is a word that isn’t even in the 48-year-old’s vocabulary. He wants to die the way he lived: onstage.

“I think about the last concert we just played in London. We sang 30-some songs, a lot of my heroes were in the audience and we played everything until it hurt.

“Yeah, that’s the way I’d want to leave it.”

BON JOVI’S CIRCLE TOUR, BY THE NUMBERS

750,000 Pixels in the large curved video screen

800,000 Total watts that the sound system can generate

21,933 Hours of labour that went into the manufacturing of the stage set and tracking video columns

9,000 Feet of aluminum used to build the stage

6,000 Amps of power generated by the lights during one stadium show

4,300 Square footage of the large high def video screen behind the stage (largest in the world)

1,000 Total number of road cases used to transport all the equipment for the tour including lights, audio, video, stage, band instruments, wardrobe, etc.

905 Total kilowatts of power consumed during one stadium show for lights, audio, video, rigging, motion control and robots

500 Number of cups of coffee made on tour daily

150 Weight of the outdoor stage in tons

135 Number of shows on the entire Circle Tour

97 Number of Bon Jovi songs that the video team had to program content for in case they are played during the tour

80 Number of local crew members recruited in each city to help build and tear down the production/staging

68 Number of touring crew members

30 Number of countries Bon Jovi will visit on the Circle Tour

Bon Jovi - Love's the Only Rule

I was bored the last couple of nights so I put this video together.

Bon Jovi: Bon Jovi goes full throttle

Sounds like the Canadian dates are going well.

I wish Jon would sit down though.  He could cause some long term damage if he doesn't take it easy.  Being a Martyr isn't a fun thing, unless he's a masochist  and there's some fiction inspiration for you!

Also we're back to vanilla.  The set list was pretty standard.  Which is disappointing  after the "72" songs played at the O2, you'd think that they would come back across the pond and be all reinvigorated but nope, same old Jon, Same old band.

Bon Jovi goes full throttle

By MIKE ROSS, EDMONTON SUN

Last Updated: July 15, 2010 11:47pm

 Jon Bon Jovi belts out a power ballad to a crowd of 40,000 at Commonwealth Stadium on Thursday night. (Amber Bracken, Edmonton Sun)

By now, all the good Bon Jovi jokes have been used up.

Like: Maybe 100,000,000 Bon Jovi fans CAN be wrong.

Or: If a tornado hit, there would be no casualties because all the people who live in trailer parks were at the Bon Jovi concert.

And how about a new one in the wake of Bon Jovi suffering a torn leg muscle while performing last week: It’s just a stage he’s going through.

OK, he didn’t actually fall through the stage. Apparently, his leg just sort gave out towards the end of the first show of the tour in New Jersey. It happens to many 48-year-olds doing much less strenuous or interesting things. Taking out the garbage, say. This old man is rocking.

But at the end of the day — Thursday night at Commonwealth Stadium, more specifically — there is no joke. The supernaturally attractive singer proved he is still a masterful showman capable of causing mass spasms of uncontrollable 80s nostalgia from the 40,000 fans in his complete control, whether they liked it or not, and of course they all liked it. You could tell by the mass spasms.

Also, deafening cheers, rousing singalongs and squeals of feminine glee every time the frontman tossed his stadium hair or flashed his stadium grin for the humongo-tron cameras.

Livin’ on a Prayer, You Give Love a Bad Name, Bad Medicine, Wanted Dead or Alive — these songs will live forever, much like zombies.

Fitting that as the sun set, the band roared out of the gate with an old one, Blood on Blood, a song about an undying friendship, much like the one that exists between Bon Jovi and its fans since the 80s. Even the new stuff had the pungent aroma of that wonderful decade.

Saving the true crowd-pleasing chart-toppers till later like deadly bullets in its holster of hits, the band deployed several tunes from its new album, The Circle. These included We Weren’t Born To Follow, which is a song about rebellion that isn’t specific about whom we should be rebelling against, no mention of “the Man.”

The video screens showed multiple images of Jon and his hair and his grin, along with the Dalai Lama, Martin Luther King, J.F.K., Hendrix and even Elvis, whose importance in the history of rebelliousness is arguable.

But that doesn’t matter. Almost every Bon Jovi song is a vaguely empowering anthem on topics both worldly and personal, espousing simple, wholesome values.

Most choruses are easy to sing along to. They were all performed full throttle last night, as if each song was last encore of the night. They could’ve ended the show anywhere, really.

Jon sang like a champ and made a valiant effort on all the rock star moves with his gamey leg. What a trouper.

Richie Sambora, meanwhile, tore of one screaming riff after another. By the fourth song, they were covered in sweat.

Jon did a great job rousing the crowd to frenzied heights of excitement. Early on, he shouted, “This ain’t television, baby — get out of your seats, get out of your seats, get out of your seats!” Obedient fans, we did, only to be rewarded with the first massive hit of the night.

I don’t care what you think of Bon Jovi music, hearing 40,000 people sing “shot through the heart and you’re to blame, you give love a bad name!” is a stirring experience. Now you’ll have that song going through your head all day.

More recent material followed before the next climax of Bon Jovi classics, the night proceeding more of less like lovemaking — fast, then slow. Hard, then soft. Not necessarily in that order.

Say one thing for these guys: they know how to pace a rock show. Bon Jovi has been at this long enough to make it look easy.

Of course, for all their gifts, at the end of the day, they’re still just doing Bon Jovi songs. They are to blame, they give rock a bad name. Kidding! Just another cheap joke.

Opening act Kid Rock seems to be aiming for that mysterious demographical nexus between rednecks and hip-hop fans, a combo that makes as much sense as the African-American Confederate Flag Preservation Society (AACFPS). Weird, but there it is — and no one owns this peculiar musical genre better than Kid Rock.

Rare is the performer who can pull off mangled versions of Sweet Home Alabama and Everyday People in the space of 10 minutes.

Mr. Rock also warmed up the crowd with a song about a rock ’n’ roll Jesus, a song where he mentions wanting to have sex with your wife, and a song that sounded like Can’t You See, but wasn’t.

He played piano, he played guitar, he played drums, he rapped, he went heavy metal, he went country, he led the crowd in a chant of his own name. How’s that for a multi-talented ego?

This guy literally wears lots of hats. None of them are very good, but points for trying. And more points for declaring that all the music heard was made by real musicians.

“This ain’t no Britney Spears bull---!” he said. Sad one should even have to mention it these days.

Bon Jovi: Bon Jovi doesn't let injury hamper concert

Bon Jovi doesn't let injury hamper concert

Wounded rocker's vocals right on the money for sold out crowd

By Heath McCoy, Calgary Herald July 15, 2010 4:03 AM

Bon Jovi performed a sold-out show Wednesday at Pengrowth Saddledome. Attendance 16,000.

Whether you're a devoted member of the Bon Jovi fan club or you're more apt to goof on the band, hard rock-lite heartthrobs that they are, you have to give a hard working rocker like Jon Bon Jovi credit where it's due.

The man has always given the impression that he's knocking himself out for the fans when he's standing on the stage fronting the band that is his namesake.

He even powers through painful injuries suffered on the job, like the calf muscle he blew out during Bon Jovi's Friday night gig in his hometown of New Jersey.

That's the sort of thing that's been known to put many a pampered rock star out of commission for a bit of a bed and beauty rest and time to lick the wounds.

Not so for this 48-year-old rocker who brought his band to Saddledome on Wednesday night for a Calgary Stampede gig.

Like Bon Jovi keyboardist David Bryan said in an interview before the concert: "He's our race horse," and that race horse put on an impressive showing at the Dome in a sold-out gig that went on for a good two-and-a-half hours.

Hitting the stage with Blood on Blood it was clear the singer was working through an injury in that he favoured his strong leg and he wasn't quite as rambunctious as he can be.

He acknowledged as much too, rewriting a line from Blood On Blood as "me, I'm the one-legged singer in a long-haired rock 'n' roll band."

But he didn't let it slow him down -- much. During hit songs like You Give Love A Bad Name, Born To Be My Baby and It's My Life he actually pogoed and broke out a few moves on that one leg, and he didn't look all that silly doing it, either.

In fact, to the many ladies in the audience who came to drool at the guy, he looked fine. Was that a squeal I just heard? Mighty fine, I suppose.

Unlike so many classic rock bands, Bon Jovi is able to push its new tunes on the audience as well, without losing momentum.

That was clear during songs like We Weren't Born To Follow, Work For The Working Man and the band's foray into contemporary country rock, Who Says You Can't Go Home?

A huge part of the show's success was down to the band, who played it loose but with real authority, guitarist Richie Sambora and drummer Tico Torres driving the sound.

As for our wounded hero, his vocals were right on the money, warm, raspy and soulful, and throughout the evening he emitted the charisma of man who had something to prove.

One of the highlights in that proving was a version of the '80s hit Bad Medicine, which incorporated Roy Orbison's Pretty Woman. It brought the roof down.

At press time the encore had begun and Jon limped up to the mic leading his band through an excellent version of Wanted Dead or Alive.

The fans, of course, loved the show, but even Bon Jovi's detractors would be jerks not to admit that the band with the beat-up frontman won the fight on Wednesday night.

Non Jovi: Goodbye Boss

As a third generation Yankee fan I say goodbye to the Boss.  No, not Bruce, but George M Steinbrenner III.

As a kid growing up in NJ I couldn't understand why the Yankees couldn't make it to the pennant, the only time they made it during the 80's was 1981 and they lost the world series to the Dodgers.  In 1986 I had to suffer as all Yankees fans did with the Red Sox/Mets match up (I mean who do you root for?  It's a lose lose situation right there).  I couldn't understand why those drug addicted Mets had world series rings, and my Hero Don Mattingly went without.  Donnie Baseball didn't even make the pennant until 95 when they lost to the Mariners, and in 96 they brought in Tino Martinez.  And Donnie baseball rode off into the sunset.

I just hated him (Steinbrenner), he brought in all these players and none of them won a world championship.

In 1992 I moved to Florida, into the Tampa Bay area.

Over the last 18 years he has given so many things to this community.  When you get hospitals, Stadiums and schools named after you, you're normally a president or someone famous for being a leader or being courageous.  But Mr Steinbrenner did these things for whatever reason, guilt, joy, many of these things were done anonymously.  It was always fascinating to me meet people who had interactions with him over the years, they always told stories about his anger and he would 'fire' everyone (especially people who worked at the Radisson on Rocky Point) and hire them back moments later.  No one ever said that he was a bad person but they always talked about him with respect.  He appreciated hard work.

Over the last 14 years the Yankees have been awe inspiring to watch.  There have been so many highs as well as so many lows.  There is not a better team in sports, period.  Over the last 37 years he put the pride back in pinstripes. 

Goodbye Mr Steinbrenner, we will miss your spirit, your compassion, but most of all your love for the New York Yankees.

Bon Jovi: Jon on Crutches

In case you have not seen it. Jon was on Crutches yesterday before the show. Or on his way to the show.

I once again stand by my comment that it would have been much more tragic if he had fallen down and broken his ass. MUCH more tragic.