* with the exception of 2
So picking up where I left off about a month ago (you should read the Bon Jovi Saga Vol. 1 first, I am not technically inclined to know how to link the post in this post but it's on the site), when I put on "Crush" at 1am the night I got it, It's My Life was the first track, so this was a good start. Then it got a little weird and maybe I should have read the writing on the wall with Real Life.
"Crush" (2000)
"Crush" has some good songs but also some truly bad ones. The good songs are quite good, It's My Life, Just Older, Next 100 Years, Two Story Town. The bad ones are wretched, in particular Thank You For Loving Me. I know people like this song and some play it at their weddings but to me it's awful, just awful. I used to love Save The World, solid power ballads are my bread and butter, but I tried listening to this a little while ago and it is just mega cheesy and the guitar solo is weak. Mystery Train is okay but not fantastic. I Got The Girl is kinda terrible. One Wild Night is like It's My Life 2.0 but misses more than it hits. Nonetheless, I still ended up re-buying the Australian Tour Edition of this album for the bonus 5 song live disc. Which is pretty good. And I saw them at the ACC on this tour and it was solid. Never Say Goodbye was played acoustic in the encore, which was amazing.
It's My Life then is a double-edged sword. Yes, it brought new listeners (generations) to the band. But it also cemented into the band that they needed to be a commercial force to be relevant. They needed to sell out large arenas and while half of "Crush" is introspective (in as much as Bon Jovi can be), half it is shooting for the rafters. Unfortunately, for me, each album after "Crush" started leaning 90% towards a rafter shooting / pop-rock safe zone vs. "These Days" and "Destination Anywhere" introspection. And maybe this is where the band wanted to be, selling out arenas with as much mainstream appeal as possible. '80's music survivors, still going strong in the 2000's. Who can blame them?
"One Wild Night Live" (2001)
As mentioned earlier, I really felt Bon Jovi was a formidable live act, so I was pumped when I heard they were releasing their first official live album. Unfortunately, what we got was a live compilation spanning 1985-2001, not a full live show. While there are highlights (namely the "These Days" and "KTF" songs), it is not a cohesive representation of a live Bon Jovi experience, nor is it even a double album. Definitely a missed opportunity.
"Bounce" (2002)
Everyday was the lead single ... for those of you counting this song can be considered It's My Life 3.0. It's serviceable but not classic, but it pumped me up for the album. "Bounce" is the band's response to 9/11 (not as obvious or heavy-handed as you would think) and some songs are good on this one, Undivided, All About Lovin' You, Misunderstood, The Distance, Bounce. But Joey and Right Side Of Wrong are terrible. I know the press kit when this album was released said these 2 tunes were the return to the band's "singer-songwriter" roots but seriously, Joey is one of the worst Bon Jovi songs ever and maybe even one of the worst songs ever. I did see them on this tour twice, the first concert was great but the 2nd was the first time I saw Bon Jovi phone it in. Plus, I was unsure why no "These Days" songs were finding their way into the set. The silver lining was that the Goo Goo Dolls were great as openers x 2. Iris, Slide, Name, etc. are great late era power ballads.
"This Left Feels Right" (2003)
Remaking your rafter shooting hits as mellow campfire songs. But not unplugged. I wrote an amazon review on this one, which I think captures my feelings well, so please feel free:
http://tinyurl.com/lwh764v
But I still did find the import collector's edition of this album with a bonus live DVD of acoustic performances and that made things sort of better. Though, that said, I haven't played this album since 2003.
As an aside, I got married in 2003 and there were are a few great Bon Jovi moments. The first was when the wedding party all slow danced to Always and everyone sang the song at the top of their lungs on the dance floor. The second was when the DJ ended the night with a Bon Jovi medley of Livin' On A Prayer/It's My Life/Bad Medicine. Everyone was going nuts. Bon Jovi are the people's band forsure and this is my struggle.
When they started out, they were the people's band, diamond selling albums, huge tours, etc. The '90's put them as survivors but mid-tier survivors. The 2000's put them back on the top-tier map and they are still on the map really. They are like the new Stones, minus the critical acclaim, but in 2010 I saw them back-to-back at the 50,000 capacity Rogers Center and it was full both nights. So, yeah, they are still kind of a big deal, but at the expense of creating new songs that I actually want to listen to repeatedly in 2015. More on this later...aside over and moving on.
"100,000,000 Bon Jovi Fans Can't Be Wrong" (Box Set, 2004)*
This is actually a cool concept and one of the two exceptions on this list. A 4-CD, 1 DVD compilation of previously unreleased or rare material from the Bon Jovi vaults. I have no issues with this release, I thought it was a nice treat for fans, contained some good songs and it made me excited for the upcoming studio release.
"Have A Nice Day" (2005)
Have A Nice Day is a solid lead single, albeit It's My Life 4.0. It is stronger than Everyday and it made me excited that this record would be good. The press kit leading up to every post-2000 Bon Jovi album touts the forthcoming record as "return to roots", a "loud rock record", etc. No doubt "HAND" has good songs, I Want To Be Loved, Story Of My Life, Last Man Standing, but the country duet of Who Says You Can't Go Home and the rock version of the song itself are, well, I'm not having it. Plus, the rest of the album is mostly filler. Bells Of Freedom, this is a song title and it is as bad as that title. I did see them maybe 3 or 4 times on this tour though. Still a good live act in my mind at this point, but again, the sets were really light on "KTF" and "TD" songs, i.e. 2 songs maybe of the former included and zero of the latter. And really the only "Crush" songs played were IML and Just Older, maybe Captain Crash (but I've blocked this out because that song is definitely not one of my faves). Only Bounce and possibly Everyday were aired from "Bounce". So it was the same greatest hits being trotted out along with some songs from the new album, half of which weren't good. JBJ has said he doesn't want to be "nostalgia act" but when your new releases do not produce many classic or even good songs, what else can you play at shows? Additionally, I'm not sure Bon Jovi's fan base want to hear anything outside of the classics. They aren't looking for deep cuts and that's probably my issue for being a "die hard".
I should mention also that by this point I didn't have a fully negative opinion of the band. I was still going to the concerts, I was still buying the albums, I was still talking to others about the band. I made myself best of compilations after every new album. They released new music every year from 2000 to 2005, which was quite prolific. But each release started getting less play than the one before from me. Thoughts about Bon Jovi's setlists and how "samey" they were started creeping into my head. Other bands were coming more into focus for me. I was really starting to get into Springsteen and the White Stripes and Oasis was just about to release "Don't Believe The Truth" and begin a career resurgence.
It comes down to the music. I never re-visit any of the albums that I've spoken about so far in this post. I do re-visit "These Days", "Slippery", "Keep The Faith" and "New Jersey" fairly often.
"Lost Highway" (2007)*
The other exception on the list, but I was very skeptical at first. A Nashville-inspired Bon Jovi record. After the nightmare that was Who Says You Can't Go Home, I wasn't exactly banging down the door wanting to get this. Everyone was going country in 2007. Hell, people still are. Hootie is still famous because he went country and it fits him well. But "Lost Highway" was an understated, somewhat introspective record with guitar solos. They let Richie off his leash again. I'm not sure if he was having personal issues at this point but his playing on this record is inspiring. Whole Lot Of Leaving, (You Want To) Make A Memory, Lost Highway, Til We Ain't Strangers Anymore, these are all great songs. Though I'll dock this album a point for including my least favourite Bon Jovi song ever, the career nadir We Got It Goin' On. They have played this song live at EVERY show since 2007. Who likes this song??? No one, except Big & Rich, who likely get royalties every time it is played.
I saw them I think 4 times on this tour. The set lists contained a few surprises, Richie Sambora singing These Days, JBJ pulling out Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah but, of course, they also contained the faithful war horses. But the exception here was that the "Lost Highway" songs were pleasant to hear live. People were reacting positively to these songs also. The band seemed to be having fun and there were no auto pilot shows here, except for maybe the one I saw in Sarnia, ON at the Bayfest festival, but I'll give that one to them as there were massive bugs flying all around the stage.
By the time 2007 rolled around, I had means to get albums as they were leaked online before they came out officially so I was already listening to "LH" about a month before it went on sale. As an aside, the Internet is a double edged sword for me when it comes to music. I do like the ability to hear something before it comes out ("try before you buy") but it clearly takes away the excitement and anticipation that I used to feel on new release day, where maybe you only heard the single and had to wait to hear the rest of the record.
"Lost Highway" is the only post-2000 Bon Jovi release that I re-visit every now and then.
"The Circle" (2009)
The lead single We Weren't Born To Follow is pretty terrible. So bad in fact that they had to re-record the initial version to include an actual guitar solo when JBJ calls out "guitar" in the middle of the song. But yet the band feels the need to keep playing this song in concert to this day and include it in the pantheon of their greatest hits. Anyway, there are some good songs on this one, Brokenpromiseland, Thorn In My Pride, When We Were Beautiful, but the bad truly outweighs the good. And the documentary that accompanies this release is something else. JBJ really comes off as arrogant and self-serving. He's a business-MAN, the CEO. The band are his employees. We get it, you're awesome. Now, please back it up with better tunes.
As mentioned earlier, I did see the band twice on this tour at the Rogers Center and the concerts were good. They played Damned and Something For The Pain (maybe Diamond Ring too now that I think about it) from "These Days", so that was a bonus. I was pretty close to the stage the 2nd night (see below).
(Photo courtesy of my friend Jara)
These are the last two Bon Jovi concerts I've attended and potentially, the last ones I will ever attend (but not likely really). Kid Rock opened and he was actually pretty good. I've always enjoyed the "Devil Without A Cause" hits + Picture. He also has a great command of pyrotechnics.
"The Greatest Hits" (2010)
This could have been an amazing and proper career-spanning compilation that highlighted good songs from all eras. A double album release like the Rolling Stones' "40 Licks".
But hold the phone, they had both a single and double disc edition. The single disc edition was essentially "Crossroad", with It's My Life, We Weren't Born To Follow, Have A Nice Day and the country version of Who Says (it won a Grammy, so duh!) tacked on. All the "KTF", "These Days" and "Lost Highway" songs were relegated to the 2nd disc, which was only available if you bought the Ultimate Collection, which of course, I did. I'm a completist, even in the "down years" of a band's career. Living In Sin, Never Say Goodbye, Just Older and none of "7800 Degrees Fahrenheit" or "Bounce" made the cut, even on an "Ultimate Collection".
The 4 new songs were not great. The More Things Change was kind of like winking at the band's career fortunes and is okay, but I don't think I've played it since 2010. Again, a missed opportunity to preserve and showcase the best parts of the band's legacy and maybe introduce people to songs they don't know.
"What About Now" (2013)
This is easily my least favourite Bon Jovi album. The only song I remotely enjoy is I'm With You, and maybe What's Left Of Me, because it sort of sounds like Someday I'll Be Saturday Night. The rest is just awful. My 7 year old daughter really liked the first single Because We Can so I gave her the CD when I purchased it (again, completist) and it stayed in her room CD player for about a year until I found it cleaning up about 6 months ago. That is how much I missed listening to this one. I'm not even going to put an audio / video clip of any of their songs off this one on here.
I think Bon Jovi hit Toronto 5 times on tour for this record. I went to none of these shows, marking the first time I've missed a tour since 1993. I just didn't have a lot of interest in going to see the same old songs and new songs I was not into at all. To top it off, Richie Sambora left the tour and is now subsequently out of the band. Richie's been battling some demons over the past few years and I'm not going to comment as everyone has their issues to sort out. But I just can't fathom how after 30 years with a band (a successful one at that) it's over without a real reason given. There is a lot of speculation over the internet, but we will likely never know the real reason for this break-up.
While the "What About Now" tour racked up big box office receipts, it obviously couldn't have been very fun for the band given all the issues that went on behind the scenes. The clips I saw showed a tired band that in a lot of cases was going through the motions. I've seen Springsteen I think 8 times now and that man is a revelation. He made the Rogers Center feel intimate. Plus, I've never seen him play the same set twice, even on the same tour. I realize that Bruce's songs are maybe "deeper" than Bon Jovi's but he isn't afraid to pull out the rarities or change things up based on the crowd, regardless of what's on the setlist. I also realize that I love Oasis and they play the same set for an entire tour, night in and night out and this doesn't bug me. I think it's because the expectations have been set. Or maybe that the songs they choose to play are better.
Maybe I hold Bon Jovi on too high a pedestal and they are bound to not to be able to live up to it...but the issue there is that they did pretty much live up to it from 1986 to 2000. Maybe, aside from "These Days", "New Jersey", "Slippery" and most of "KTF", Bon Jovi have never been a strong "album" band. But it just seemed like they were trying harder on pre-2000 efforts. I think once you like and invest in a band, it's hard to be objective towards anything they've done. If it's good, it's the "best thing ever" and if it's bad, it's the "worst thing ever". The in-between songs just don't cut it.
I'm sure Richie Sambora will eventually re-join Bon Jovi for the inevitable reunion tour at some point. And you know, I likely will go to at least one of these shows. I have no issues with his replacement Phil X, who is Canadian and a good guitar player, but to me that's not Bon Jovi. Maybe I just really need a long break from the band and when that reunion hits in 5 or so years, I'll be ready to ride that steel horse again. I kinda hope so.
Until next time...
