Welcome to our new trivia section!
In unsteady time-lags here you will find some background information about different Bon Jovi related topics that we'd like to share with you.
#2 The "black sheep" ballad
As with everything in life, there's usually one exception to the rule. For Bon Jovi, that was the Bounce record. Not only was it to be mostly dismissed on the tours to follow, it also was the only record not to feature on the band's 2010 "Greatest Hits" release, even losing out to a track from 7800° Fahrenheit.
But more specifically, it was the album to feature their weirdest-treated single: All About Lovin' You. Now, every single from an album of theirs, no matter how successful the record might've been, got at least a certain amount of exposure on tour. In 1989, for example, their smash ballad I'll Be There For You was basically cut for the odd few months to make room for Living In Sin. In 2011, The More Things Change made a few more appearances since German radio stations were playing it at the time.
One song that was left out of this was the ballad off Bounce. Now, for the last two decades, numerous "conspiracies" have arisen with regards to this and probably most of it can never be fully verified. It may well be that the song was just connected to some unpleasant memory for one of the band members and hence they refrained from going back to it. Even the background information posted on the band's website at the time was as vague about it as can be:
"ALL ABOUT LOVIN' YOU is the classic Bon Jovi love song. It's simple and endearing in its message. In the wake of the events of September 11th, many people rediscovered what was truly
important in life. And appreciating the love of another has always been at the top of that list... but many people were reminded. This song puts priorities where they belong."
The last sentence actually can be regarded as quite an ironic statement, given the band's treatment of the song. It was never played during their promo cycle and on tour, the slow songs off the album were always either Joey or Right Side Of Wrong. Even the other "ballad spots" on the setlist kept being occupied by Bed Of Roses (or the very occasional Always) or Richie singing I'll Be There For You. It was already rumoured at the time that the record company had rejected the first song order for the album since they didn't see enough single material on there. The "Target EP" which consisted of a number of left-over tracks showed that Bon Jovi might've well wanted to go for a more edgy sound overall. Much as with It's My Life on Crush (which kind of had the same rumours surrounding it), All About Lovin' You felt like a song that wasn't connected to anything else from the sessions in particular. Even the ballads from that era like We Can Dance, Open All Night or You Had Me From Hello showed that Jon was aiming for a more storyteller-like approach and not gunning for the bigger power ballad on the album. Another interesting factor is the actual existence of such a well-produced acoustic version. Stylistically, that one closes in much more on the ballads Jon seemed to be fond of at the time and gives off at least a similar vibe as the ones mentioned above and the ones featured on the album. It can be speculated that Jon had found his love for lyrics-heavy, lower-key ballads just as John Hiatt's "Have A Little Faith In Me" which got performed numerous times throughout 2003 - and that this didn't match with the ideas of the record company who wanted something in the vein of Thank You For Loving Me sound wise.
The video
The music video for "All About Lovin' You" continues the story of Jack (portrayed by Tom Sandoval) and Jill (portrayed by Rachel Nichols), the young couple from the "Misunderstood" music video. The video begins with Bon Jovi playing in a large room in a New York building, as Jack jumps off the roof of the same building while Jill watches below. Memories of his relationship with her, including his infidelity seen in the beginning and ending (most notably in the uncut version) of the previous video, flashes before him as he falls. As a crowd gathers in shock, Jack releases a parachute with the words "Will You Marry Me?" written on the inside of the parachute, aimed as a proposal to Jill below. He lands safely and they embrace, giving the presumption that she agreed to the proposal.
At the time, there were even the craziest rumours surrounding it. Jon had visibly dyed his hair in a certain, unnatural colour tone and when asked about it on the set of the video shoot, he allegedly responded sarcastically: "I wanted something to match the occasion." Now keep in mind that this wasn't only hearsay, but got copied and translated from fan forum to fan forum at the time. Yet, it had some fans believing it was Jon's "act of rebellion" against the record company's choice for the single.
The reception of the video was quite mixed as well. Within the fanbase it got a lot of criticism for the jumping scenes. Parts of the album deal with the attacks from 9/11 where many people jumped out of the twin towers due to their desperation of being trapped in a burning building with no hope for rescue. So many fans found this video distasteful or at least it not being the right time for a scene like this.
The "fateful" TV show appearance
Now, fans that might've been randomly scrolling across Youtube might be thinking: "but I've seen and heard them do this song, so what is this all
about?"
Yes, the song was done. But the circumstances leading up to it were basically as crazy as the rest surrounding it. On May 26th 2003, Jon and Richie were guests in the TV show "TV Total" in Germany, a sort of late-night format basically targeted at a younger
audience (in comparison to the US formats). The host, Stefan Raab, was known for playing all kinds of pranks on celebrities or getting them to join in on funny actions they usually didn't do. As
Jon and Richie appeared that night, the band's guitar player clearly had been enjoying some drinks backstage (something they even joked about). As Raab was directing the interview towards the
story line of the then-current single, All About Lovin' You, he asked him directly if they'd come back to play the song the next day in case he managed it to have someone pull off a similar
stunt: Jump down on a bungee rope and propose to his girlfriend. At first, Jon was playing this off as a joke and when he realized that Raab was serious in his approach, he aimed at "we'll come
back", but Richie quickly agreed to the bet which visibly wasn't to Jon's liking (the following day was the band's day off). As the story went, a guy jumped, his girlfriend agreed to marry him
and Jon and Richie sat there and sang "All About Lovin' You" for the couple the night after.
The night it appeared on tour
After that performance, the band went on to play in Vienna and it felt like that one-off thing had already been forgotten. Then, three days after their appearance on TV Total, Bon Jovi played in Gelsenkirchen, just 80 km away from the TV studios they had been in before. The concert again was one to spark rumours. As fans were entering the pit area, they could overhear crew workers discussing that the show was on the verge of cancelation "due to the singer's health". As we know by now, the concert went ahead, but Jon entered the stage and immediately threw a cup into the face of a photographer in the front row which could be seen on the stadium's screens by the audience. To this day, the reason for that remains unknown. Furthermore, he went back numerous times to have someone work on his neck and back and didn't talk much until he had to introduce Richie for I'll Be There For You. Even though his spirits seemed to rise near the end, the band took their final bows and were about to leave after the combo Bad Medicine and Shout.
All of a sudden, Jon returned and started strumming the chords to All About Lovin' You with visibly no one else on stage having known about this. As Jon proceeded to sing it, Richie joined in, replicating the performance from a few days earlier. At the same time, David was sitting on his keyboards, not knowing what to do whereas Tico and Hugh had already left, seemingly unaware of what was going on. This was, in some way, the "perfect" bookend to what All About Lovin' You had been from the start: the "black sheep" ballad and weirdest-treated single in the band's history.
