Bon Jovi

They say every cloud has a silver lining and for Bon Jovi that couldn't be any more true... With the untimely and sad death of Michael Jackson last year, it created a gap at the O2 Arena for someone to take his place to try and fill a few of those nights that the King Of Pop would have been performing at. Step forward Bon Jovi. (a very lucrative silver lining on their cloud).

There is no doubt that this band have the talent to fill oversized arenas to capacity and were certainly the right choice for a two week residency at the former millennium dome.

However I do have one negative comment to make about their shows and that is quite simply the extortionate amount they charged for tickets. Starting from £75 and increasing upto £1000 if you wanted to be right at the front, which in my opinion is an incredible betrayal of their fans.



Bon Jovi live are always an incredible band to see, and on this opening night of their UK Circle Tour, there was never any doubt about them delivering the goods. Which they did with such ease, they even did a little set on top of the roof of the o2 arena in the afternoon much to the surprise of the fans who had started to queue already.

Once the evening arrived and we had found our seats in the arena. It was interesting to see that their stage was a very humble affair and looked fairly small in comparison to previous tours. However throughout the show the stage took on a personality of its own using the latest in video technology and rotating screens to create an effect which was mesmerising and was definitely able to give U2 a good run for their money in terms of technological advances for live shows. These special effect gave the impression that the stage was a lot bigger than it really was.

The opening track 'Blood On Blood' taken from their nostalgic 'New Jersey' album, managed to get everybody to stand up and sing along. This seemed to be one of those nights where the entire audience knew every word to every song.

Jon Bon Jovi and Richie Sambora (Guitarist) seemed to be genuinely happy to be on stage entertaining the loyal fans, and the dialogue in-between songs was sometimes witty like when he looked at the audience and said, "The only American Idol you need is standing right here." Clearly a dig at the show in a nice non- offensive way. That is one of the adorable things about this band, they never seem to go out of their way to offend anybody, it is one of those bands that you can take your mum, grandma, and younger kids too because you know they won't be brainwashed into thinking about things in a certain way. They try not to preach and tell their fans how they should vote or which campaign to donate money to (If only U2's Bono would take note).



With such a huge back catalogue of songs it was impossible for their fans not to enjoy the show, obviously the classics such as 'Livin' On A Prayer', 'Keep The Faith' and 'You Give Love A Bad Name' all got the audience dancing and singing along.

There were a couple of nice surprises such as their cover version of 'Hallelujah' with Mr Jovi standing on a platform that had been placed in the middle of the front section of the audience to make him stand above everybody and be worshipped by the fans that idolised him.

The rest of the band eventually joined Jon Bon Jovi on the raised platform to perform acoustic versions of 'Something For The Pain' and 'Someday I'll Be Saturday Night' and even Richie Sambora took centre stage to sing 'Lay Your Hands On Me' which was a very pleasant surprise.

By the time Bon Jovi had finished their opening night, they had spent over two and a half hours belting out songs, which by today's standards is a long time to be on stage, but the amazing thing is the band were able to maintain the fans attention throughout every second of the performance. So they are certainly doing something right.

Even the fans who had paid in excess of £1000 pounds to be near the front felt like they had got their moneys worth, so I suppose all in all Bon Jovi did their job exceptionally well and definitely deserve their residency at the o2 Arena. Without question these are still one of the best bands around when it comes to live shows.

Setlist:
Blood on Blood
We Weren't Born to Follow
You Give Love a Bad Name
Whole Lot of Leavin'
Born to Be My Baby
Lost Highway
When We Were Beautiful
Captain Crash and the Beauty Queen from Mars
We Got It Goin' On
Bad Medicine / Roadhouse Blues [The Doors cover]
It's My Life
Love's the Only Rule
Lay Your Hands on Me
Hallelujah [cover version]
I'll Be There For You
Something for the Pain [acoustic]
Someday I'll Be Saturday Night [acoustic]
I'll Sleep When I'm Dead
Work for the Working Man
Who Says You Can't Go Home
Keep the Faith

Encore:
In These Arms
Wanted Dead or Alive
Livin' on a Prayer

Bon Jovi also played a short set on the roof of the O2 prior to this show:

We Weren't Born to Follow
Superman Tonight
You Give Love a Bad Name
It's My Life

FUTURE GIGS

sorry, we currently have no gigs listed for this act.