What Does Jon Think Of His Albums?
I always wondered that? Does he think that his failed albums suck?
Bounce failed commercially and there was nothing from that album on the Greatest Hits. At one of his Bounce shows in Jersey, he said that Bounce was a really great album. I wonder if he still feels that way? Same with the 90's albums that failed in the states. Does he think those albums sucked? Or does he realized that they were just released at the wrong time? |
I think whatever Jon thinks, we will never actually know.
|
Jon once said that at each time of an album release you think "that's the best one I've achieved so far" and with a few years distance to each release you're able to judge it better. He stated multiple times that he hates the Fahrenheit record, but back in the day he was convinced it was going to be a hit album. Even though he even complained about the lousy production of it in the 80's.
The problem is that Jon starts to dislike an album whenever it fails to achieve the success he wanted it to be. Up until Lost Highway, to some extent maybe even The Circle, I believe Jon in saying that he liked each album most when it was released. I don't think that can be said for What About Now. That was nothing more but an excuse to make some quick money with an overpriced tour to me. The more I look at it the more I get the feeling that Jon just knew his voice was going to give in within a short range of time and that's why he forced this tour against all odds before his range was totally gone. |
I think he believes each one was the best he could do at the time it was released or he wouldn't have released them. I think he truly believes in each song he puts on a record at the time. Distance might give him another perspective, but sometimes it doesn't. I mean, he still plays We Weren't Born to Follow every night and it sucks, wasn't a big hit, and most fans seem to not like it. But he obviously believes in it. He's a songwriter before he's anything else and those songs are his babies.
|
I think the setlist doesn't tell anything about what he likes or what he doesn't.
90 % of the songs are songs that will work in getting a stadium going. Sure enough die-hards hate Cpt. Crash and Who says and Born To Follow. But at the end of the day all of them work in a stadium - everybody's waving their arms, singing thousand "alrights" or let Jon hearing say "yeah, yeah, yeah, oh yeah". So in my opinion nobody can tell what he thinks about certain songs, as long as they work. In the When We Were Beautiful documentary he says that it's a struggle between what the fans like and what he wants to play for himself. He mentions that they did the whole Lost Highway album a couple of times, he liked it but the fans hated it. So according to the sets, this is what forces him. It's a tough question to answer. I'm with bonjovi90 and Becky that he's convinced of the albums the day they are released. But with some years between...I really can't tell. |
Quote:
|
Some intersting quotes by Jon on the albums. Of course some quotes are from a couple of years after the release while some are during the promotion of the album.
Bon Jovi Jon: Now I'm ready to admit that our first album was too pop. We went into the studio and did everything the way we were told to. The songs stand up today, but the music lacked an edge ~ from 1985 7800 Fahrenheit Jon: I believe that this album is more adult. I grew much in one year. I always like my first album, but I think this one is much better: songs, songwriting, production, everything is in progress. In any case no one can say that the album is made for radio stations to like it. ~ from 1985 Jon:I really can’t complain about that album; it was a rushed job but that was my fault and in a way it was the perfect second step because it allowed us more time to build. ~ from 1986 Slippery When Wet Jon: Switching producers, we considered how much better a live band we were than in the studio, and why? What were we doing wrong? Basically, we weren`t having fun in the studio, going in there to work. With Slippery we went in there to have fun, and we did a lot of demos too, so there was no worry about, "Can I play this part?", or "Can I get this feel?", comfortable with everybody and it comes across. ~ from 1988 Jon: All the songs on Slippery stand for something because it was sucha milestone! ~ from 1995 New Jersey Jon: What can I say? I think “Living in Sin” and “I’ll Be There for You” are really good songs. Some of the others aren’t the greatest songs but “Lay Your Hands On Me” is a big audience favorite. ~ from 1994 Jon: New Jersey picks up where Slippery left off and it keeps going. It’s a little up to the left you know. It’s a way for us to familiarize ourselves with our fans and show them what we’re doing now. ~ from 1988 Keep the Faith Jon: After the Blaze Of Glory album I was so tired of having to prove that it wasn't all a fluke. Blaze defended New Jersey. New Jersey defended Slippery. I was done with that and I needed to make a statement, which I tell Keep the Faith did - the song, the look, the whole album. ~ from 1993 Richie: There are tracks on the record that are quite Bon Jovi-esque, that still have the good power hooks but different twists. I mean “Dry County”’ will take people out a bit just as much as the title track. To stagnate would’ve been a disaster. The way I look at it is that we’ve gone to a new island but we’ve built the bridge for people to follow us there. Since the last album, so much has happened in music and in our lives. We took a break to put life back into ourselves. Now we’ve tons of energy. We’re on fire! ~ from 1992 These Days Jon: These Days, although I didn't feel it at the time, was a very dark record. ~ from 2001 Richie: We thought These Days was positive, but when Jon and I looked at it there were social statements like “These Days”, or “Hey God”, “Something For the Pain. Even the love relationship stuff is all pretty dark, but none of us were unhappy. I was getting married and what were we singing about? It was obviously something in our past that needed to come out, but we had a really good time making that record too. ~ from 2000 Crush Jon: It’s a big old happy rock record to tell you the truth. It’s an anthem, written for stadiums. Rock record! It’s a record that could be performed every night. You can sit down with two acoustic guitars and play every song. It’s not the kind of record that people rely on technology and you go, “oh yeah but what you need here is the hip-hop machine, or what you need here is 49 people coming in on the chorus”… These are selection of songs that we could sit around and play ‘em for you on two acoustic guitars. ~ from 2000 Tico: After 4 years from touring, 5 years from our last album, the magic is still there and you know, after 60 songs you have 12 really good ones. And looking at our audience, the audience is brand new, as well as the older people that have our old catalogue. But I see people that, this is the 1st time, this is the 1st Bon Jovi record they’ve ever owned. And that’s good. That means we did something that’s creative in today’s age. ~ from 2000 Bounce Jon: With the reinvention of the band with Crush, obviously there was an adrenaline flow. We were back, our popularity continued. We felt that we had a voice again. We knew what we wanted to say with this record. What began as a simple collection of pop songs became much more appointed post 9/11 because we won’t write anything for the sake of fluff. There was no like “shake your booty” kind of lyrics. There wasn’t gonna be that. It was gonna be a social record. You have social commentary with “Everyday”, 9/11 commentary with “Undivided” and the Palestinian situation in “Hook Me Up” and then it gave me something to build on. We felt energized but we also felt like it was a productive time. And the recordings then went very easily. ~ from 2002 Richie: Bounce wasn’t so much fun, but we still shivered it up in everybody’s ass and made a lot of fun. That’s true. ~ from 2012 Have a Nice Day Richie: This album continues the evolution of Bon Jovi, obviously, but I had it in my head to make a big-sounding rock & roll record. I wanted to capture the essence of this band, almost like in a live setting, because that's our forte. That's where I was trying to put it. I wanted to be aggressive, really. I felt that was available to us now. ~ from 2006 Jon: was a very interesting record. This was done very differently than anything we’ve ever done before. The songs weren’t really demoed, something we’ve always done for years. This time we made the songs with a drum machine and then brought in Tico and Hugh at the end of the recording process for about a day and a half. ~ from 2005 Tico: I think it’s a powerful record. It has a lot to say. When a record is fun to do, it often turns out to be a good record. ~ from 2005 Lost Highway Jon: I think I am guilty of making a mistake in misrepresenting that we were going to Nashville to make a country record. I think I can better describe it by saying it’s a Nashville-influenced Bon Jovi record. We’ve just twanged up the sound a little bit. ~ from 2007 Jon: As it stands right now, it's a pretty special record for us. We went in and said we're just going to write some songs. And the beauty of it is that it turned out well. ~ from 2007 The Circle Jon: One and one makes three with this record because Richie was so great and focused. It made a great record; it’s a real guitar record. ~ from 2009 Jon: The intention this year was to do only two or three songs for a Greatest Hits album. But then came October 2008, the economies of the world changed and a new president was elected in the U.S. in November. So there was a lot of subject matter and we started writing up a firestorm. Before you knew it, not only did we have the songs for the Greatest Hits but we had a heck of an album. ~ from 2010 David: Richie shines like crazy on this record. ~ from 2009 What About Now Jon: We’re very happy with the album. We worked very hard; it has taken a year to get it done. We’ve cut 43 tracks in the last year. It’s crazy! ~ from 2012 Richie: It's an evolution for Bon Jovi. Just basically pushing the production a bit more or lessening the production so you're a bit more naked. It goes both ways on this particular record. We've stripped it down, taken some away and added some different elements, also. And, y'know, with us we just do the songs, man. Jon Bon Jovi and I, when we get together it sound like Bon Jovi. It sounds like us. That's basically the way it is and what comes out comes out. The lyrics are very positive, obviously Because We Can, What About Now, it's all empowering and that's what we were trying to get to. We were trying to get some positive lyrics. That's kind of where we landed. ~ from 2013 David: This album is like rock with lots of keyboards in it, actually, which I like. ~ from 2012 |
Quote:
Notice they said that they had fun with the These Days record. Another thing they seem to have failed to do since that album. |
Quote:
Thanks DryCounty! Great Work! All these quotes were interesting to read and reflect back on. |
Quote:
Also I think Richie's quote about Bounce: " Bounce wasn’t so much fun, but we still shivered it up in everybody’s ass and made a lot of fun. That’s true." I could swear he said "made a lot of money", not fun. But you did a hell of a job collecting these quotes, this was a great read. |
All times are GMT +2. The time now is 12:58 PM. |
Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.11.
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.