Jon Bon Jovi with his wife Dorothea Hurley in 1988 © Getty “But Johnny and Bruce, 25 miles away from where I grew up - that made it real.” “Led Zeppelin, whose poster hung on my wall - they were too big to think you could ever be like them.
He grew up inspired by the “Jersey Shore” sound, a rock scene centred on the state’s seaside resorts and roadside bars, a working-class circuit where Bruce Springsteen cut his teeth alongside bands such as Southside Johnny & The Asbury Jukes. (Hair is another major theme in Bon Jovi’s life.) Mrs Bongiovi, briefly a Playboy bunny before joining the military, had a job as a florist. His parents were both ex-Marines, each working six-day weeks. Born in 1962, he was raised with two brothers in Sayreville, a New Jersey factory town 30 miles south of New York City. Hard work is a recurring theme in Bon Jovi’s life. It was 27 months of focused work,” he says ruefully. “I would have invested my life savings, everything I had ever earned. The failure of the bid in 2014 was no laughing matter, however. And this very small town has a very large inferiority complex,” he says with a chuckle. “My business partners being Canadian, there was an assumption that I was going to move the team across the border. Jon Bon Jovi at The Savoy © Kalpesh Lathigra Radio stations wouldn’t play the band’s songs. Bars declared themselves “Bon Jovi-free zones”. It made him the most hated man in Buffalo, the team’s upstate New York hometown. Meanwhile, Jon joined a consortium bidding to buy the US football team the Buffalo Bills, a tantalising opportunity to secure an NFL franchise. A complicated dispute with their record label, Mercury Records, led the band to leave its roster, sign elsewhere and then return to a Mercury subsidiary. “I couldn’t sing in the shower!” he says. The upheaval provoked a long period of musical inactivity after the tour ended. You don’t just say, ‘I don’t want to come into work today, I’m not in good shape.’ F*ck you.”
And as a band we had to circle the wagons because of the resp-ons-ibil-ity” - Bon Jovi enunciates each syllable as though chiding the absent Sambora - “responsibility to each other, to the crew, to the records, to the fans.
Jon Bon Jovi (left) with Richie Sambora in the mid-1980s © Getty The final straw came during the 2013 tour when the guitarist failed to turn up to a Canadian arena concert. In this he is unlike the punctual, clean-living Bon Jovi. Sambora’s departure followed a long struggle with drink and painkiller addiction, involving spells in rehab and missed shows. The man formerly known as John Bongiovi has Sicilian roots on his father’s side. From time to time, in order to emphasise a point, he leans forward to tap me lightly on the knee, an endearing act of tactility. Perfect teeth, strong jawline, fit physique, blue jeans, big watch, hair a buoyant ashy thatch. At 54, Bon Jovi has retained his famous good looks. We sit facing each other in daintily upholstered chairs, by a table with a bottle of artesian water shipped from Fiji. “I can delve deeper into that if you want,” he says, fixing me with his blue eyes. From left, David Bryan, Tico Torres, Jon Bon Jovi, Alec John Such and Richie Sambora © Getty It is their first US tour without guitarist Richie Sambora, who left in 2013. Their “Because We Can” tour was the highest-grossing in the world in 2013, earning $205m according to trade magazine Billboard.īut the one starting next month marks a new chapter in the band’s 34-year life. As with other bands of their vintage, live performance is where the real business lies for Bon Jovi these days.
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