REVIEW: BON JOVI AT ASHTON GATE STADIUM, BRISTOL (27/06/11)
Walking into the packed Ashton Gate stadium to see one of the staples of the mainstream rock diet, Bon Jovi, I couldn’t help but wonder why Bristol didn’t get more big gigs. Granted, bands like Take That and Bruce Springsteen are probably too big for the 20,000 plus capacity football ground, but acts such as Pet Shop Boys and Oasis are perfectly suited to such a venue. No need for Bristol, Glos, Wilts and Somerset folk to sit in a 2-3 hour long queue of traffic getting across the border to Cardiff! It was a nice surprise then to see one of the biggest touring bands in the world, Bon Jovi, doing a one off gig at the stadium.
According to the venue’s website, Bon Jovi was due on at 8pm. Sadly, I missed the first few songs as he came on early but I did arrive in time for a raucous rendition of It’s My Life. It’s fair to say the stadium was populated with a predominantly female audience, many of whom spent much of the show swooning and screaming at frontman Jon Bon Jovi – and boy did he know how to play them, winking, pointing, grinning and making suggestive remarks about foreplay (or lack of). Interestingly, a number of the crowd were also at the Take That gig in Cardiff recently (I know this cos I saw them sharing phone pix and talking about it) and one woman hit the nail on the head saying this gig had a much better atmosphere. Hardly surprising when you consider the music of Bon Jovi has a lot more bite and the fans are less precious.
While the rest of the band looked a bit like a slightly better looking Status Quo tribute, Jon has hardly aged at all since he first gained fame back in the 80s with their self titled debut album. He commanded the stage like a true pro, singing back to back with members of his band, throwing his arms sky high and holding the mic stand out to the crowd. His insanely white grin told us he still loves what he’s doing and this passion certainly rubbed off on the crowd, who were singing along not just to the hits – like Blaze Of Glory, Wanted Dead Or Alive and Livin On A Prayer but to the lesser widely known numbers, including early single Runaway, Captain Crash And The Beauty Queen From Mars and Living In Sin.
Highlights included In These Arms (which I’m sure every woman in the joint thought he was singing to them), Sleep When I’m Dead and Someday I’ll Be Saturday Night. He lost it a bit in Keep The Faith, when his maracas were well out of time. and the crowd took the slow song of the encore, It’s Hard Letting You Go, as a cue to go to the bar. Ironically. But then things picked back up for the finale of Livin On A Prayer – a notoriously difficult song to sing. Nevertheless, this didn’t stop the crowd who did the first verse for the band. There were some disappointed punters that there was no Always in there, but you couldn’t really fault them for the rest of the set – hell they even threw in a cover of Roy Orbison’s Pretty Woman.
You know what you’re getting with Bon Jovi – solid rock pop to sing/dance along to while the frontman does his thing in front of a captivating light show. And you know what, there’s nothing wrong with that every once in a while.
Words, photo and videos: Laura Williams
