Van Halen opened for Bon Jovi in Europe in 1995?

[jammindude]

Part of this may be regional too.   There was a very east coast/west coast delineation in the days of radio before the internet. 

For example.   In the Seattle market, Sammy Hagar was HUGE before he ever joined Van Halen.  I was shocked to discover the rest of the country had mostly never heard of him beyond I Can't Drive 55. 

His first band Montrose had a hit called Rock Candy that was a CONSTANT radio staple when I was growing up.  And when he went solo, Red, I'll Fall in Love Again, Baby's on Fire, Can't Get Loose, Heavy Metal, Your Love Is Driving Me Crazy, Three Lock Box, Remember the Heroes and I Don't Need Love....oh and This Planet's on Fire (Burn in Hell)....all were fairly constant rotation at the local rock station.    So obviously, someone with authority in Seattle radio loved him.   I'm only bringing this up as an example that things could be very regional at the time.   

I never said Bon Jovi wasn't huge.   Top 10 hair metal band for sure.  Maybe even top 5.   Just floors me how much more popular they are in the rest of the world.   This thread title is the perfect example.    There was NEVER a time that Van Halen would have been opening for Bon Jovi in the states.   

[KevShmev]

Hagar has always been huge here in St. Louis, and he often credits our city as being his biggest supporter over the years.  The local hard rock station does a March Bandness every year (mimicking the March Madness tournament), and the winner is usually Zeppelin, Floyd, Rush or Hagar.  The fact that Hagar can hang with those giants speaks volumes to how popular he is here.  I like Sammy, but he's not that good. 

[jammindude]

In These Arms, that was another massive hit in Britain. They basically owned the early 90s, at least where I grew up.

This statement floors me.  I'm actually really ticked at grunge for what it did to every other decent band on the planet.   I know of at least a dozen amazing bands who either went broke or....more like "and"....either quit or kept going.    I don't know of any band who "owned the 90s" except grunge bands, Metallica, and maybe the tail end of the GNR craze. 

[King Postwhore]

Where did grunge come up in Dave's post?

[KevShmev]

U2 has as much ownership of the early 90's as any band, but while some doofuses can worship grunge for killing the hair rock of the 80's (which is a bull shit narrative), I could argue that mainstream rock has never recovered from grunge. The blandness of grunge and a lot of alternative rock did not age well, and once other genres took over the mainstream (hip hop, dance pop, etc.), it was like a lot of musicians didn't even want to take a crack at rock music anymore, and most rock music worth a damn stays just under the surface instead of being mainstream.  Meanwhile, the masses worship Ed Sheeran, who writes some of the blandest music ever.

[jammindude]

Where did grunge come up in Dave's post?

It didn't.  He said Bon Jovi owned the 90s, and that just seemed preposterous to me because no one owned the 90s except grunge (and Metallica and GNR)

[jammindude]

U2 has as much ownership of the early 90's as any band, but while some doofuses can worship grunge for killing the hair rock of the 80's (which is a bull shit narrative), I could argue that mainstream rock has never recovered from grunge. The blandness of grunge and a lot of alternative rock did not age well, and once other genres took over the mainstream (hip hop, dance pop, etc.), it was like a lot of musicians didn't even want to take a crack at rock music anymore, and most rock music worth a damn stays just under the surface instead of being mainstream.  Meanwhile, the masses worship Ed Sheeran, who writes some of the blandest music ever.

But with U2, we're starting to step outside the rock circle just a bit.   I mean....it was college...alt...pop....rock-ish.....but not in the same scope of the bands we've been discussing.   Is it?

[Indiscipline]

^^ Their ballads 'Always' and 'Bed of Roses' were massive hits in Britain when I was a kid. Non-stop radio play.

Speaking of Europe, really this.

1995 is the key. There was just no escaping Always around Europe since the Greatest Hits came out in 1994 and Bon Jovi had become a full blown pop act. By then Van Halen was sort of a beloved spent force, and I believe much of Eddie's guitar craziness we had loved during the previous decade (a great selling point in the old continent) was kind of replaced by new idols such Gilbert, Nuno and our Johnny P.

Still, I can't understand what VH should be ashamed about.   

[MirrorMask]

Heck, Always was the song that introduced me to a world of foreign music. And I still think it's one of their best ballads, and one of the best ballads of the genre. It was impossible, I agree, to not know it back in the day.

And I think Keep the Faith is Bon Jovi's best album 

[KevShmev]

U2 has as much ownership of the early 90's as any band, but while some doofuses can worship grunge for killing the hair rock of the 80's (which is a bull shit narrative), I could argue that mainstream rock has never recovered from grunge. The blandness of grunge and a lot of alternative rock did not age well, and once other genres took over the mainstream (hip hop, dance pop, etc.), it was like a lot of musicians didn't even want to take a crack at rock music anymore, and most rock music worth a damn stays just under the surface instead of being mainstream.  Meanwhile, the masses worship Ed Sheeran, who writes some of the blandest music ever.

But with U2, we're starting to step outside the rock circle just a bit.   I mean....it was college...alt...pop....rock-ish.....but not in the same scope of the bands we've been discussing.   Is it?

Maybe not, but did you refer to bands in general that "owned the 90's," and as big as Guns N' Roses, Metallica and Nirvana all were in the early 90's, none were bigger than U2, although I get what you mean as those other bands all ROCKED, while U2, by the early 90's, was more of a pop rock band, for lack of a better term.

[ZirconBlue]

New Jersey had another hit besides Bad Medicine?   I always thought New Jersey was the swan song that was never quite as good (or well received) as Slippery When Wet, which was obviously massive. 

Well, New Jersey only sold 18,000,000 copies worldwide.  But that wasn't the end of their career.  Obviously, album sales declined in the digital era, but every album since Slippery When Wet has made the top 10 US album charts.




Top 40 songs in the US:
1984  #39  Runaway
1986  #1    You Give Love a Bad Name
1986  #1    Livin' on a Prayer
1987  #7    Wanted Dead or Alive
1987  #38  Edge of a Broken Heart
1988  #1    Bad Medicine
1988  #3    Born to Be My Baby
1989  #1    I'll Be There for You
1989  #9    Living in Sin
1992  #29  Keep the Faith
1993  #10  Bed of Roses
1994  #4    Always
1995  #14  This Ain't a Love Song
2000  #33  It's My Life
2005  #23  Who Says You Can't Go Home
 

[King Postwhore]

Only. Lol

[TAC]

Yay, Bon Jovi thread! Thanks WildRanger!

[Elite]

Yay, Bon Jovi thread! Thanks WildRanger!

[Art]

Bon Jovi was absolutely huge here in Brazil in the early/mid 90's. Even in the early 2000's, It's My Life was played A LOT here. He can easily play big arenas here, as a matter of fact i think he played a Stadium here last year, or the year before that.


 You Give Love a Bad Name, Livin' on a Prayer, Wanted Dead or Alive, Bad Medicine, Born to Be My Baby, I'll Be There for You, Keep the Faith, Bed of Roses, Always, These Days and It's My Life were all (in some degree or another), big hits in Brazil, you heard them on the radio, on MTV, even in som soap operas, believe it or not.

[Anguyen92]

^^ Bon Jovi headlined a day of Rock In Rio, last year.  That typically draws a big crowd.  Around 80k-100k.

[jammindude]

New Jersey had another hit besides Bad Medicine?   I always thought New Jersey was the swan song that was never quite as good (or well received) as Slippery When Wet, which was obviously massive. 

Well, New Jersey only sold 18,000,000 copies worldwide.  But that wasn't the end of their career.  Obviously, album sales declined in the digital era, but every album since Slippery When Wet has made the top 10 US album charts.




Top 40 songs in the US:
1984  #39  Runaway
1986  #1    You Give Love a Bad Name
1986  #1    Livin' on a Prayer
1987  #7    Wanted Dead or Alive
1987  #38  Edge of a Broken Heart
1988  #1    Bad Medicine
1988  #3    Born to Be My Baby
1989  #1    I'll Be There for You
1989  #9    Living in Sin
1992  #29  Keep the Faith
1993  #10  Bed of Roses
1994  #4    Always
1995  #14  This Ain't a Love Song
2000  #33  It's My Life
2005  #23  Who Says You Can't Go Home

The 90s was my big transition from being into death and extreme metal back into straight up metal and especially prog with the release of IAW.   And obviously, I was inundated with all things grunge (not just the big 4, but also bands like Candlebox, Screaming Trees, STP...etc...etc..)   RHCP also hit their peak around that time in the early 90s.    Heck, I worked at Tower Records in 92/93.    I say all this to back up the fact that I was not living in a cave during the time in question.     I have never even heard of anything on that list after "I'll Be There For You".   

As I'm typing this, I looked up Keep the Faith because I was shocked that I didn't hear something that was supposedly a hit right in the middle of working the Xmas rush at Tower Records the year it came out.     I do recognize the cover of the album after seeing it.   But I don't recall it selling that well.   Remember that this was the Seattle area at the very peak of the grunge explosion.   I remember the big 4 along with RHCP selling like hotcakes.   Enya was really hot at the time as well.   Tori Amos had just released Little Earthquakes and that was just starting to take off.   But I don't think Bon Jovi even cracked our top 20, and I didn't know a single person who had heard it.   

[King Postwhore]

That's because you were surrounded by snot nosed elitists who thumbed their noses at popular, stadium rock.

It isn't that hard to figure out.  You walked in different circles.

[KevShmev]

My excuse is that in 1992, I was knee deep in classic rock I was discovering, not to mention getting into Rush, which was like winning the musical lottery.  I was in a totally different place at the time.   And all of the friends I hung out with were way more into classic rock than anything else.

To this day, I still cannot name one song from this Bon Jovi record from '92.

[jammindude]

That's because you were surrounded by snot nosed elitists who thumbed their noses at popular, stadium rock.

It isn't that hard to figure out.  You walked in different circles.

DUDE....regardless of what circles I was hanging out in, I was working at one of the most popular CD shops in the entire Seattle area...and I’m telling you that barely anyone from the general public came to the register to buy this album.   I had lines to the back of the store over the Xmas season from the start of my shift to the end of my shift.     The people in line were not people who walked in my circle.   It was the CD buying public.

[ZirconBlue]

As I'm typing this, I looked up Keep the Faith because I was shocked that I idn't hear something that was supposedly a hit right in the middle of working the Xmas rush at Tower Records the year it came out.     I do recognize the cover of the album after seeing it.   But I don't recall it selling that well.   Remember that this was the Seattle area at the very peak of the grunge explosion.   I remember the big 4 along with RHCP selling like hotcakes.   Enya was really hot at the time as well.   Tori Amos had just released Little Earthquakes and that was just starting to take off.   But I don't think Bon Jovi even cracked our top 20, and I didn't know a single person who had heard it.

Interestingly, Little Earthquakes and Keep the Faith both went double Platinum in the US.  (Keep the Faith sold a lot more in the rest of the world, though.)

[jammindude]

As I'm typing this, I looked up Keep the Faith because I was shocked that I idn't hear something that was supposedly a hit right in the middle of working the Xmas rush at Tower Records the year it came out.     I do recognize the cover of the album after seeing it.   But I don't recall it selling that well.   Remember that this was the Seattle area at the very peak of the grunge explosion.   I remember the big 4 along with RHCP selling like hotcakes.   Enya was really hot at the time as well.   Tori Amos had just released Little Earthquakes and that was just starting to take off.   But I don't think Bon Jovi even cracked our top 20, and I didn't know a single person who had heard it.

Interestingly, Little Earthquakes and Keep the Faith both went double Platinum in the US.  (Keep the Faith sold a lot more in the rest of the world, though.)

That is very interesting.   And it wasn’t like she was selling a ton at the store either, but I’m sure I just noticed her more because she was one of those acts that was “trending up” and Bon Jovi (at that time) was significantly “trending down”......double platinum is a pretty drastic downswing from the previous two albums.    So that, moreso than anything else mentioned, could be tainting my view.

EDITED to correct the fact that I accidentally typed my comment inside of Zircon's reply bubble.

[King Postwhore]

That's because you were surrounded by snot nosed elitists who thumbed their noses at popular, stadium rock.

It isn't that hard to figure out.  You walked in different circles.

DUDE....regardless of what circles I was hanging out in, I was working at one of the most popular CD shops in the entire Seattle area...and I’m telling you that barely anyone from the general public came to the register to buy this album.   I had lines to the back of the store over the Xmas season from the start of my shift to the end of my shift.     The people in line were not people who walked in my circle.   It was the CD buying public.

Certain city's/pockets in the US and especially in Seattle where most fought against Popular music.  So that would be the first place where no sales are happening for the bigger acts.  Yes there was a decline for Bon Jovi but 5 million is nothing to sneeze at.

Hell, Moving Pictures for Rush sold 2.6 million and that was their highest selling album of all time.  The were all over the radio then.

[Dave_Manchester]

In These Arms, that was another massive hit in Britain. They basically owned the early 90s, at least where I grew up.

This statement floors me.  I'm actually really ticked at grunge for what it did to every other decent band on the planet.   I know of at least a dozen amazing bands who either went broke or....more like "and"....either quit or kept going.    I don't know of any band who "owned the 90s" except grunge bands, Metallica, and maybe the tail end of the GNR craze.

As I said earlier though, it's a question of different places and musical 'cultures'. Manchester England in the early 90s was very different to Seattle USA. Those grunge bands you mentioned were and are almost totally unknown where I grew up, except of course for 2 or 3 Nirvana hits. On the other hand, how many of the Britpop/rock bands (who were massive in England at that time) were taking over the American West Coast in the early 90s? Oasis and Blur I expect you've heard of, but The Charlatans, Ocean Colour Scene, Republica, Garbage, The Stone Roses? Those bands resonated with British culture at that time in a way that the grunge scene simply didn't.

As for the curious case of Bon Jovi, I don't know why they were so huge in Britain in the early 90s (other than the simple fact that they wrote very ear-catching tunes and had a charismatic frontman), but they were. That Greatest Hits album ('Crossroads') came out in 1994 and its songs were played everywhere. The same thing happened when Aerosmith put out their own Greatest Hits album ('Big Ones') the same year, and that similar brand of uncomplicated stadium-friendly rock anthems was played everywhere. Crazy, Cryin', Amazing, Dude Looks Like A Lady, Love In An Elevator, Living On The Edge...every kid in my school knew all those songs intimately, whereas I can almost guarantee that not one of them could name 2 Van Halen songs. Different musical culture, that's all. There's a reason the leafy aristocratic villages of rural England produced so many of the pensive prog rock greats, whereas only a decrepit working-class urban shithole like Birmingham could give us the angry passion and fire of Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin.

[rumborak]

Very late to the party, but I will mention that Jon Bon Jovi was a huge factor in their success in Europe. Europe very much likes strong (and good-looking) frontmen, and Bon Jovi kicks VH's butt in that regard, no matter which iteration of it.

[KevShmev]

Very late to the party, but I will mention that Jon Bon Jovi was a huge factor in their success in Europe. Europe very much likes strong (and good-looking) frontmen, and Bon Jovi kicks VH's butt in that regard, no matter which iteration of it.

Hard to believe that Europe didn't go crazy over Roth's assless chaps.

[Stadler]

Meanwhile, the masses worship Ed Sheeran, who writes some of the blandest music ever.

The wife, the EX-wife, the two daughters, and the daughter-in-law ALL think he dreamy AF, and they go batshit over that loopy "I'm playing with myself" shit, especially when he starts in with the "you complete me" lyrics.  I don't see it - he looks like a Hobbit to me - but I'm not his target audience. 

Jammin' is out to lunch.  Bon Jovi is STILL big.  Not '90's big, and it's mostly catalogue, but big.  He had a cross-over hit with Jennifer Nettles ("Who Said You Can't Go Home" or some shit like that) in the late 2000's. 

I saw that Scorpions/Bon Jovi show, too.  I was there for the Scorps (I've never been a huge Bon Jovi fan, still aren't) but Bon Jovi put on a good show.  You knew they weren't going to be an opening act for long.   The Scorpions were really good, though,  Great setlist. 

[Stadler]

In These Arms, that was another massive hit in Britain. They basically owned the early 90s, at least where I grew up.

This statement floors me.  I'm actually really ticked at grunge for what it did to every other decent band on the planet.   I know of at least a dozen amazing bands who either went broke or....more like "and"....either quit or kept going.    I don't know of any band who "owned the 90s" except grunge bands, Metallica, and maybe the tail end of the GNR craze.

As I said earlier though, it's a question of different places and musical 'cultures'. Manchester England in the early 90s was very different to Seattle USA. Those grunge bands you mentioned were and are almost totally unknown where I grew up, except of course for 2 or 3 Nirvana hits. On the other hand, how many of the Britpop/rock bands (who were massive in England at that time) were taking over the American West Coast in the early 90s? Oasis and Blur I expect you've heard of, but The Charlatans, Ocean Colour Scene, Republica, Garbage, The Stone Roses? Those bands resonated with British culture at that time in a way that the grunge scene simply didn't.

As for the curious case of Bon Jovi, I don't know why they were so huge in Britain in the early 90s (other than the simple fact that they wrote very ear-catching tunes and had a charismatic frontman), but they were. That Greatest Hits album ('Crossroads') came out in 1994 and its songs were played everywhere. The same thing happened when Aerosmith put out their own Greatest Hits album ('Big Ones') the same year, and that similar brand of uncomplicated stadium-friendly rock anthems was played everywhere. Crazy, Cryin', Amazing, Dude Looks Like A Lady, Love In An Elevator, Living On The Edge...every kid in my school knew all those songs intimately, whereas I can almost guarantee that not one of them could name 2 Van Halen songs. Different musical culture, that's all. There's a reason the leafy aristocratic villages of rural England produced so many of the pensive prog rock greats, whereas only a decrepit working-class urban shithole like Birmingham could give us the angry passion and fire of Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin.

This is a great post.   I'll just note that I sang the praises of Garbage here a couple weeks ago and I got a lot of "who?".



The Charlatans were called "The Charlatans UK" here in the States.  I love that song "The Only One I Know".   

[Peter Mc]

Yeah, Van Halen not a major band in the U.K. at all. People would probably recognise Jump if they heard it but wouldn’t necessarily know who played it. No other VH song would be recognised by the general public. Bon Jovi have had You Give Love a Bad Name, Wanted Dead Or Alive, Livin On A Prayer, Lay Your Hands On Me, Born To Be My Baby, Bad Medicine (Ill Be There For You not a big hit over here), Keep The Faith, Bed Of Roses, Always, It’s My Life and more. In the mid 90’s they were one of the biggest bands in the world. Also tickets were on sale long before VH were announced as support. I actually went to the show and there was no comparison between the two bands. I was really into both bands but Van Halen were so dull, I could’ve just put the cd on and had the same experience, everything was just played exactly as it was on the record. Bon Jovi were in a different league, JBJ is a massively underrated frontman, one of the best I’ve seen in his pomp. Sambora just went to town on loads of his solos, lengthening and embellishing them. Easy to see why one was opening for the other.

[Stadler]

Actually, the 'I could have played the record' kind of surprises me.  Van Halen is a lot of things - not all of them great - but they usually brought something to the live versions.  Live, they were a little more bare bones and hopped up, in my experience.   

[jammindude]

Ive seen video bootlegs from the early days (circa WACF and FW) that literally made my jaw hit the floor.   It was literally like they had 3 “frontmen” who were playing their asses off. 

It was a gritty 8mm and I was still a bit taken aback at how much they owned the arena from the opening chords.   The band I saw personally in the Hagar days PALED in comparison to what I saw on that bootleg.   

[Cyclopssss]

My love for Van Halen probably more or less died in 1985. I never really accepted Sammy Hagar as the lead singer for Van Halen and that is probably my loss. I just couldn't see it. They went from really special to just another rock band for me with Hagar. Bon Jovi was pretty big in those days so I can see VH opening for them.

[WildRanger]

The same thing happened when Aerosmith put out their own Greatest Hits album ('Big Ones') the same year, and that similar brand of uncomplicated stadium-friendly rock anthems was played everywhere. Crazy, Cryin', Amazing, Dude Looks Like A Lady, Love In An Elevator, Living On The Edge...every kid in my school knew all those songs intimately, whereas I can almost guarantee that not one of them could name 2 Van Halen songs.

Aerosmith started as a band in the early 70's, but they haven't be on the European/worldwide radar(outside of North America) until 1986 and a Run DMC version of "Walk This Way". For Americans they are the 70's band who put out classics as Toys and Rocks, for Europeans they are the late 80's/early 90's band who had a few MTV hits. What a shame. I think this fact woud come as a shock to most American fans.
I think Dream On and maybe Sweet Emotion are only two known Aerosmith songs of the 70's globally.

[Peter Mc]

Actually, the 'I could have played the record' kind of surprises me.  Van Halen is a lot of things - not all of them great - but they usually brought something to the live versions.  Live, they were a little more bare bones and hopped up, in my experience.

Not on this occasion, perhaps it was because they were not headlining or it may also have been around the time EVH was recovering from cancer, I seem to remember AVH was also bandaged up, think he may have been in an accident or something.  To be honest the band Thunder, who actually opened the show, were far more entertaining and better showmen than VH.  Sammy Hagar made no impression at all and I am not a Van Hagar hater, I really enjoy the Hagar records.  If you listen to Live Right Here, Right Now though, they pretty much just play the songs straight, no great spontaneity there from memory.

[Stadler]

Wasn't Alex sporting a very rock'n'roll neck brace for a fair amount of time in the '90's?  I seem to recall that.  I feel back for him personally, since that might be a lot of pain, but it looked ridiculous.