What I’ve Learned: Jon Bon Jovi

4 min readJon Bon Jovi is an American entertainment institution. He rose to prominence in the eighties as the frontman for his band, Bon Jovi, and has remained there ever since. His band has released sixteen records during its tenure, and he’s released two solo collections. Jon Bon Jovi has starred in feature films as well as TV series, and owned and operated an arena football team. This summer, he returned to touring with his band for the first time since he underwent vocal-cord surgery four years ago.I was never the best at anything. I was never the great athlete; I was never the guy that the girls liked the most. But I was the guy that was like, “Why can’t I be on the team? Why can’t I be that guy?”New Jersey was thirty minutes away from New York. Thirty-five. What it gave us: New York radio, New York television, New York newspapers, proximity to the big concert venues. But what also benefited us was growing up in the suburbs. You could cut your teeth away from the spotlight. No one was looking.When I was seventeen, eighteen, I was an outlier. I never went to university or even considered it. You joined the service; it was real blue-collar. But my parents saw I had a kind of focus, so they were like, “Go. Chase your dream.” They used to say, “We knew you were hanging out in the bar and you were underage, but at least we knew where you were.”My mom was a Marine and a Playboy Bunny. Talk about juxtaposition. She was like, “Boot camp didn’t scare me none.” So when she said Camelot was real, and you can go to the moon, that’s good enough for me. She passed a year and a half ago. She was tough, she was a pain in the ass, but we were really at peace.We were blessed in Jersey because down the street were Jesus and the disciples. Having Bruce Springsteen jump onstage with you while you’re still in high school; having Southside Johnny produce my first band, the Rest; not going to my high school prom because I opened for the [Asbury] Jukes, was pretty cool.The bigger the star, the nicer the person. In early ’81, my little band and I are getting out of a cab. I see flashbulb, flashbulb, paparazzi. The Rolling Stones had just pulled up to go into the studio, and the photographers jumped out of the garbage can yelling, “Mick! Mick!” as they do. Mick grabs me and my mates and says, “Here’s my new band, the Frogs.” I’d pay anything for that fucking photograph.Eighties style? Guilty as charged. Big shoulder pads, jeans tight as can be. And people talk about the big hair, but it’s just that my dad was a hairdresser, so, you know, mine looked good.You don’t know when you’ve written a great song. There were many times where I’ve gone, “Got it!” Wrong. And then other ones, I didn’t hear. “Livin’ on a Prayer” was completely written. The lyrics, the chord structure, and the melodies, it was all finished. But the high note at the end of the second chorus, the key change at the end, the bass line, which is what makes it really work, that happened in rehearsal. So I have no clue.I’m glad that it didn’t happen for us sooner. I’m glad it took three records. Because we were primed for it. We knew how to tour. We knew how to win hearts and minds.There’s been a couple of challenging periods for the band. In 1990, we were seriously exhausted, mentally and physically. It happened again in 2000, but in a good way, when I was making a lot of movies. Then in 2013, when Richie [Sambora, Bon Jovi guitarist] had his issues and never came back. And the vocal surgery [in 2022] was another trying time. There have been serious ups and downs, but that’s what a real career is: It’s peaks and valleys.Recovery from surgery has been a lot longer than I ever anticipated. It’s frustrating because I didn’t do anything wrong. If you said, “You blew your brains out for the last twenty-five years, this is what happens,” I would say, “Yeah, gotcha.” But the only thing that’s ever been up my nose is my finger.We were America’s optimism experts for a long time. I would say we exported optimism around the globe for forty-plus years. It’s been a little harder the last few years. A lot harder.My dad had a stroke four years ago, and that motherfucker will not surrender to it. At nearly eighty-seven he refuses to take no for an answer. In my arrogance I thought that I created my drive, my will, but since his stroke I go, “Oh, no, no, you stupid fool. Look where you got it from.”There’s still a lot of Catholic guilt, but I’m more in touch with my faith than I’ve ever been. I don’t ask God for favors, but I talk to him a lot.I have an incredible wife who is bigger, better, and smarter than I am. She knows that I have Lead Singer’s Disease—me, me, me—and she tolerates it. But I know when to be a good listener.I’m what’s called a specialist in the field. I never became a good woodworker or a gardener or anything like that. I can’t put a light bulb in. But I’m the best guy to invite to dinner. I can’t cook a lick, but I’ll clean the dishes.