Biography!

Its' been almost 17 years since the phenomenal beginning of this hard rock band. Bon Jovi, the band came together when John BonGiovi jr., met David Rashbaum, both of who shared a mutual interest in rock music. The two people that came together were none other than Bon Jovi's lead Jon Bon Jovi and the bands' star keyboard player - David Bryan.

They soon joined eight other musicians in the R&B cover band Atlantic City Expressway. When Rashbaum moved to New York to study at the Juilliard School of Music, Bongiovi followed. Charming his way into the Power Station recording studios, which was owned by his cousin Tony, he performed menial tasks for two years before Billy Squier agreed to produce his demo tape.  His work would also grace oddities such as the novelty track, 'R2D2 I Wish You A Merry Christmas'.

Jon reunited with Rashbaum and they acquired the services of Richie Sambora, an established session musician, Alec John Such (ex-Phantom's Opera) for bass and Tico Torres, (ex-Knockouts) a drummer and a percussionist.

Bon Jovi, thus first formed in the suburbs of their native New Jersey with these five members and released a demo single of a song called "Runaway". This track also appeared on a local artist compilation album. Much to their surprise, "Runaway" got aired on local radio and led to the band signing with Mercury/PolyGram Records.

By July 1983, they had a recording contract with PolyGram Records and support slots with Eddie Money and ZZ Top, the latter at Madison Square Garden. Jon Bon Jovi's looks attracted immediate attention for the band, and he turned down the lucrative lead role in the dance film Footloose in order to concentrate on his music.

Their debut album preceded a headline tour and support slots with the Scorpions, Whitesnake and Kiss. Their second album, 7800 Degrees Fahrenheit, was greeted with cynicism by the music press, which was already hostile towards the band's manicured image and formularized heavy rock - this mediocre album only fuelled their scorn.

The band responded in style: Slippery When Wet was the biggest-selling rock album of 1987, although it originally appeared in August 1986. Collaborating with songwriter Desmond Child, three of its tracks - 'Wanted Dead Or Alive', 'You Give Love A Bad Name' and 'Livin' On A Prayer' - were US and European hits.

Headlining the Monsters Of Rock shows in Europe, they were joined on stage by Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley ( Kiss ), Dee Snider ( Twisted Sister ) and Bruce Dickinson ( Iron Maiden ) for an encore of 'We're An American Band'. It merely served to emphasize the velocity with which Bon Jovi had reached the top of the rock league. The tour finally finished in Australia after 18 months, while the album sold millions of copies.

Having a deal with record company, and having silenced all their critics with the "Slippery When Wet" album, the boys from NewJersey, had taken to the "Big Time"!

Once the initial struggle was past, the hits came hard and fast for the band.

With the first two albums doing pretty well, but not gaining as much recognition, Slippery When Wet's timing couldn't be more impeccable. The album gave the band a world wide recognition of their talent and skills, besides also making them rock gods.

When New Jersey followed, it included 'Living In Sin', a Jon Bon Jovi composition that pointed to his solo future, although the song owed a great debt to his hero Bruce Springsteen. The album produced hits such as "Lay your hands on me", "Bad Medicine" and "Born to be my baby". The rest of 1989 was spent on more extensive touring, before the band temporarily retired.

As Jon Bon Jovi commented, it was time to 'Ride my bike into the hills, learn how to garden, anything except do another Bon Jovi record.' He subsequently concentrated on his solo career, married karate champion Dorothea Hurley and appeared in his first movie, Young Guns II, and released a quasi-soundtrack of songs inspired by the film as his debut solo album in 1990.

However, the commercial incentive to return to Bon Jovi was inevitably hard to resist. Keep The Faith, with a more stripped-down sound, was an impressive album, satisfying critics and anxious fans alike who had patiently waited almost four years for new material.  The band was accepted well, yielding hits like "Keep the faith", "In these arms".

On the back of its success, Bon Jovi occupied the UK number 1 spot with the compilation set Crossroad, amid rumors that bass player Alec John Such was about to be replaced by Huey McDonald. To those who had considered the group a spent commercial force, the success of the slick ballad, 'Always', a chart fixture in 1994, announced no such decline.

The ballad Always was a single and featured only on the Crossroad album. This ballad was a creative example to those who thought Bon Jovi could do only heavy rock numbers. The song proved to be a love anthem for many.

With a huge album selling in the back, Bon Jovi released the album "These Days" in 1996.The album featured hits such as "This Ain't a Love Song", "These Days", and "Something for the Pain".

More recently, the band released their eighth collective effort entitled "Crush". The album was supposedly to be called "Sex Sells" but was changed to the Crush name because Jon felt there was something about that name that spoke to him. The album came after a single for the movie Ed TV called "Real Life".

The Crossroad album became one of the best compilations of the time. by this time, the group had released seven albums and the group had amassed one gold and five platinum records, including '86's six-million-selling #1 album "New Jersey," '92's double-platinum "Keep The Faith," which sold eight million worldwide, '94's greatest hits collection, "Cross Road," which sold more than 12 million internationally and l1996's million-selling, Top Ten "These Days," which produced the band's Top 20 hit single, "This Ain't A Love Song."

There have also been a series of hit singles, including such arena-rock anthems as "You Give Love A Bad Name," "Livin' On A Prayer," "Wanted Dead Or Alive," "Bad Medicine," "I'll Be There For You," "Lay Your Hands On Me," "Living In Sin," "Bed of Roses" and "Always."

Their profile had never been greater than in 1995, when, in the annual readers poll of the leading UK metal magazine Kerrang!, the band won seven categories, including best band and best album (for These Days ) and, astonishingly, worst band and worst album (for These Days )! These Days Tour Edition was a live mini-album released only in Australia.

Bon Jovi's 1996 of Japan and Europe, which ended in July brought to a close this chapter in Bon Jovi history, a trip that began a Spring ago with dates in the Far East, three sold-out shows at Wembley in London, two nights supporting the Rolling Stones in Paris, a four-month-long North American tour and a first-ever concert in South Africa last December. In all, the group performed before more than four-and-a-half million paying fans.

After almost 15 years of non-stop activity, Bon Jovi the group will take what Jon calls a "self-imposed hiatus."

"At this point, we couldn't get any bigger and we couldn't get any happier," says Jon. "It's just time to walk away from it for a while."

Bon Jovi took some time off, which allowed Jon a chance to travel to London, where he filmed his first starring movie role in English director John ("Sirens") Duigan's "The Leading Man," after his much-praised debut in last year's "Moonlight and Valentino," where he co-starred with Whoopi Goldberg, Gwyneth Paltrow, Elizabeth Perkins and Kathleen Turner. The dark film has art imitating life, with Jon as an American movie star who goes to England to perform in a Painteresque drama on London's West Side and ends up insinuating himself into the playwright's home life, gradually taking over his wife and kids. Jon describes it as a sexually-charged "All About Eve," with a top-notch cast that includes Anna Galliana ("The Hairdresser's Wife"), Barry (Dame Edna) Humphries and veteran English actor David ("Morgan," "Might Morphin Power Rangers") Warner. 

He also featured in a movie, "Row your boat" potraying the character of an ex-con New Yorker, trying to make the ends meet and at the same time falling in love with an oriental girl.

"Acting is a found passion," Jon says. "I'm not going to give up my day job, as they say, but it is something I'm going to do a lot more of. When you're successful in a different field and then go into acting, you do have to try twice as hard to prove yourself. That's what I've had to go through. Everyday it's a challenge. And that's what fueled me the most...the idea of a challenge." At 1996, he was    looking to take another acting role to film by next Fall.

Both Jon and guitarist Richie Sambora will undertake their first solo projects since Bon Jovi did the "Young Guns" soundtrack in '90 (which produced the chart-topping title song and his own bit part in the movie) and Sambora recorded "Stranger In This Town" in '91.

Meanwhile, Bryan released his first solo album, through Phonogram in Japan, and Sambora married Hollywood actress Heather Locklear (ex- Dynasty ).

"I'm writing by myself, but I'm also co-writing with people like Dave Stewart and David Baerwald," says Jon, adding he'd like to record two songs apiece with five different producers for his solo album, including Grammy winner David Foster, whom he has already begun working with. "It's going to be very eclectic. I just want to try various situations to see which ones make me happy. I'm taking a 'life without a safety net' kind of attitude."

Jon Bon Jovi, in 1997 acted as lead in the movie "Destination Anywhere", besides also doing an album by the same name. The album represented Jon Bon Jovi's solo efforts, and they proved to be effective. This album fetched Jon an award at the 1998 Europe MTV music awards for best male solo.

Richie Sambora released his second  solo effort, Undiscovered Soul on Mercury in 1998.

Come 1999. and the band had come back together to do a single for the movie Ed TV starring Matthew McConnaughey and Jenna Elfman. The single was called "Real Life".

In 2000, along with working on his latest album "Crush", Jon Bon Jovi acted in a movie called "U571" along with Ed TV star Matthew McConnaughey.

Bon Jovi's latest effort "Crush" hit the stores world wide by June2000. The album is cracked up with some good ol' Bon Jovi with a touch of the modern scenario. The first single off the album "It's my life" made it to the top 10 singles charts worldwide.

As for the future, the father of two, seven-year-old daughter Stephanie Rose and five year old son Jesse James Louis, with his high school sweetheart wife Dorothea, is taking a wait and see attitude.

"Success does breed a certain degree of comfort," he admits. "I don't have to worry about keeping up with the Joneses or paying the rent. In a way, I have the same freedom now as I did before 'Slippery When Wet' made us so big. At that time, we had nothing to lose. Now I have the security to do what I want. In a weird way, you have to come to terms with your success. To the point where you can let go of it. And then you can walk taller in a different pair of shoes."

What's to come in the future for Bon Jovi, Jon and the other boys? It would definitely be interesting to wait and see! And this site would be there as and when it happens. So keep checking back often!