Bon Jovi: All the Time Band

By Steve Mason

Jon Bon Jovi is an American musician, songwriter and actor, best known as the lead singer and founder of band Bon Jovi. He is also the owner of the Philadelphia Soul who are expected to return for the 2011 Arena Football League season. Throughout his career, he has released two solo albums and eleven studio albums with his band which have sold over 120 million albums worldwide. As a solo artist, he has numerous awards for his work, including a Golden Globe and an Academy Award nomination for his solo hit: Blaze of Glory. He was awarded an honorary Doctorate of Humanities from Monmouth University in 2001. He campaigned for Al Gore in the 2000 Presidential election, John Kerry in the 2004 Presidential election, and Barack Obama in the 2008 Presidential election.

• Language: English
• Publisher: XinXii
• Release date: Jun 8, 2014
• ISBN: 9781304940766

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Bon Jovi

Like an American Def Leppard with a Bruce Springsteen fixation, Bon Jovi used good hooks, pumped-up production and stadium-sized passion to forge the pop-metal alloy that made them one of the dominant mainstream rock bands of the Eighties.

As a working-class teenager, John Francis Bongiovi, Jr. (born March 2nd, 1962 in Perth Amboy, New Jersey) showed little interest in school, preferring to sing with his friend David Bryan Rashbaum in local bands. Cousin Tony Bongiovi, owner of New York City's Power Station recording studio, let Bon Jovi sweep floors there and record demos with such musicians as Aldo Nova and members of Springsteen's E Street Band.

The nucleus of the Bon Jovi band — Rashbaum on keyboards, Dave Sabo on guitar, Alec John Such on bass and Tico Torres on drums — played clubs to support local radio play for their demo. PolyGram won a record label bidding war (reportedly signing only John Bongiovi, with the rest of the band as his employees) and had the Italian-American Bongiovi de-ethnicize his name to Jon Bon Jovi (keyboardist Rashbaum dropped his surname, becoming simply David Bryan). After seeing Bon Jovi at a New Jersey club, guitarist Richie Sambora auditioned and replaced Sabo (later of Skid Row).

Bon Jovi's self-titled debut album (Number 43, 1984) included the hits in Runaway (Number 39, 1984) and She Don't Know Me (Number 48, 1984). But Tony Bongiovi sued the band, claiming he had helped develop its sound; Jon Bon Jovi called his cousin's influence slim to none, but settled out of court. Their next album, 7800° Fahrenheit (Number 37, 1985), went gold.

Bon Jovi then made two crucial marketing moves: bringing in composer Desmond Child (former leader of the Seventies New York disco-rock band Rouge, he also wrote for Aerosmith, Cher and Kiss) as a song doctor, and basing the next album's content on the opinions of New York and New Jersey teenagers