Bon Jovi came to Chicago and gave a unique and once in a lifetime performance which featured their most recent album, Lost Highway performed in its entirety. One of the reasons Bon Jovi has always been a significant live entity is because they reign over the concert stage. They can seduce and slam an audience with emotion in a way few acts can touch and this taping, the biggest in Soundstage history, was no different. Every Bon Jovi album sounds better in the live environment, it’s more organic and the concert stage allows the songs to breathe.
A taping like this is a unique from the perspective that it’s not really a concert but a taping. I have attended these before and they usually involve multiple takes of many songs so we can make sure everything is right, but Bon Jovi exceeded expectations in this department by only having to perform one of the new songs twice (“Whole Lotta Leavin’”) and this appeared to be due to technical difficulties and not the band. “Lost Highway” is the anthem on the new album and will hopefully be the next monster single for the band. “Summertime” was fun while the performance of the latest single, “(You Want To) Make A Memory” is turning into a sublime jewel with every performance I see. “Whole Lotta Leavin’” was sprawling and epic with the multiple musicians on stage, another version that far exceeded the album version. “We Got It Goin’ On”, a rather bland song on record, proved to be much more live and in fact was entertaining. “Seat Next To You” was endearing and refined, as was “Till We Ain’t Strangers Anymore” which found violinist Lorenza Ponce taking over for Leann Rimes and she did a splendid job. The biggest surprise of the evening was the heavy on guitars, “Everybody’s Broken” which I felt was a throw away track on my first listen. It’s amazing to see the songs have new life breathed into them in this natural setting. “One Step Closer” and “The Last Night” benefited greatly from the live perspective as I had skipped over these songs on my initial listens of the album but after these performances I’ll be heading back down the “Lost Highway” to rediscover them. “I Love This Town” gets better with each listen and the band’s playfulness on stage exudes through in the performance allowing the crowd to become seduced. The tour de force moment of the evening was “Any Other Day”. One of the best songs on the new album soars with every performance and could one day be one of the defining songs of the bands set list. The solos and jams towards the end of the song with Sambora, Bandiera and violinist Lorenza Ponce are nothing short of awe inspiring. It is performances like these that keep us coming back for more time and time again. As a bonus, the band ran through a few greatest hits, “It’s My Life” (run through a few times due to technical difficulties), “Wanted Dead Or Alive” and “Who Say’s You Can’t Go Home”.
What the Soundstage performance proved was Bon Jovi is a band that never should be counted down and out for the count. I wasn’t a fan of Lost Highway and found the album to be rather bland when I heard it last month. However, the band took to the Chicago stage with focus and proved to me, just like they have so often in the past, that they are a defining live band and can make me go back and rediscover songs I had initially dismissed. The official show on A&E will air on November 10th and the DVD of the show will be in stores three days later on November 13th. The only downside to this is that to those fans who felt Bon Jovi jumped the shark with Lost Highway, this date isn’t soon enough. All in all it was a fun and interesting evening. If nothing else, it has opened a new window for me and I plan to go through it to rediscover Lost Highway.
Writer notes: Well, if the performance was half as good as Rob said it was November can’t come soon enough. There’s nothing better when a live performance sucks you in and makes you reevaluate certain songs and albums.
xT




















BWBK