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The industry said, you re out of your mind.
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You re a dead man walking.
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You re the biggest band in the world right now.
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You can t fire your big shot manager.
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Give me a good reason why.
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The word on the street was, this is career suicide.
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But the band trusted me, and we did it.
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I did it.
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One of the most famous names in rock and roll.
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Has sold over 130 million albums.
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Please welcome Jon Bon Jovi.
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Bon Jovi.
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Welcome, Bon Jovi.
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You brought in a mediator, a therapist, a coach, someone to kind of like say, hey, tell everyone how you feel.
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Oh, it wasn t easy.
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Nobody was receptive to it.
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I was receptive to it.
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The guys fought it.
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And then after a couple of sessions of it, we committed to it.
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Wow.
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I can absolutely positively guarantee you will never see me giving 50%.
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That s out of the question.
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Don t think for a moment that Richie and David and Tico didn t give everything they had.
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They gave everything they had, too.
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Everyone s always looking over the shoulder, and they ve got that, who s the bigger guy in the room?
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I gave that **** up so long ago.
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I give a **** about it.
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And I have very few regrets in my career.
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One of my few regrets...
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Welcome back everyone to the school of greatness very excited about our guests We have the legendary John Bon Jovi in the house.
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Good to see you, sir.
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Thank you, brother Thank you so much for being here my fellow Pisces.
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Yeah Arena football lover and so many other things You have this incredible docuseries that s out right now as as people are watching this and
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There s so much about it that I didn t realize about you as a human being and your heart and your vision.
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I think everyone sees the accolades, the success, the platinum records that you ve sold and the four decade career of hit after hit.
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But what they really get to watch when they watch this series is your incredible vision for making all this happen and manifesting this into your life and building and creating it for decade after decade and your beautiful heart.
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So I want to acknowledge you for your heart because I feel like
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that love and that passion is what allowed this to come to fruition, this life you ve created and the impact that you ve had with your music around the world.
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My fiancée, she s Mexican and I told her I was having you on today and she was almost in tears because she said when she was a teenager she bought a CD of yours and it was one of the the first
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Music that she heard where she started to learn English.
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Oh was because of your music, right?
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So you may you make impact on so many people s lives in so many different ways that you re not even aware of so I want to acknowledge you for that John and there was a moment in I can t remember if it was episode one or two because I got to watch the Whole thing where you talk about success and greatness I don t know if you remember this but you you mentioned about success and you mentioned greatness in almost the same sentence and
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and you give a definition of what they both are for you.
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Since this is the School of Greatness, I would love for you to talk about what the difference is between success and greatness for you.
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Well, I honestly can t remember the instance in the film, especially because it s been filmed over the last couple of years, but I guess my reaction to it would be this.
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Anyone can have success.
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you could write a jingle that becomes a hit song.
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And for five minutes, that s called success and it s fleeting.
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Or you could strive for greatness, which means you gotta do it again and again and again and again and again and again.
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And you have to work hard because it just doesn t happen.
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You know, greatness is something to strive for.
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And it is given to nobody.
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Even the most gifted of musician or athlete or business leader has to work at it in order to, you know, strive to achieve greatness.
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That s my opinion.
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Yeah.
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Do you feel like, when did you feel like you were able to reach greatness in your musical career?
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I don t know that I ever felt that way.
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Really?
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I think that that s sort of that chip on your shoulder that keeps you going.
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I do think that I ve gotten quite good at it.
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I think that given the opportunity physically, I can do it with the best of them at this point.
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But I think with every song, with every song, let alone every album,
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It s, can I do it again?
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Can I do it again?
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Can I do it again?
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How can I do it better?
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I don t think you ever think you ve achieved greatness, it s just striving for it.
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Did you ever feel like when, I think it was the third album you guys had that went like 14 times platinum or whatever it did, it was like all over the world.
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That s one of the biggest selling records ever, yeah.
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Slippery and wet.
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Was that the biggest ever of all time?
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No, no, no, I mean for us it was huge.
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But it was thriller, it was like a virgin, it was born in the USA, it was one of those.
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It was huge.
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It was massive and it was everywhere.
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When you have that big of a hit at that young of an age, I think you were like 24, 25 or somewhere around there.
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How do you, and it surpasses so many other records or accomplishments of almost every other artist.
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How do you come with the mind of this isn t my best work and I can keep reaching this type of success?
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Or do you think maybe my best work is behind me at 25?
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No, no, no, no, no, no.
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Absolutely not.
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If anything, my only regret, and I have very few regrets in my career, one of my few regrets is that I didn t take a little more time just to enjoy it because you could have, should have taken the time to really enjoy it.
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I think that part of the journey of life is that in your 20s when you ve got A, that chip on your shoulder, and there s all kinds of new surprises around every bend, you re not really sure how to navigate this journey.
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You look to mentors in some form or another to sort of guide you, and they do the best they can, but it doesn t mean that they had the answers either.
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Anyhow, you re on this journey and all we could think of, at least all I could think of, was
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I gotta do this again, I gotta make sure that nobody thinks that was a fluke, that we can do this again, we can do it again after that.
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So it was nose to the grind.
0
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And a year after the Slippery Tour concluded, and there was 240 shows and massive success for the band, we were back on the road
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with the album New Jersey, which had five more top 10 singles and another 240, 250 shows.
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One year later, just back to back, just went right back in the ring.
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You know, there s one part of the docuseries where the band, I think you guys were together for, I don t know, five years in a row, it seems like, with very little time off.
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And there s this beautiful journey that you guys created this incredible family and these incredible relationships and brotherhood and team mentality, but then,
0
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too much of a good thing can turn into a bad thing is kind of what you guys talk about in this series.
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How did you not allow too much tension to actually break this band apart after so many years of success when there was just more frustration and resentment and egos?
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How did you
0
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keep it together emotionally, mentally, spiritually, physically, when everyone s got more money than they can think of now, when everyone s got more fame and success, and their egos are at an all-time high, how did you keep it together?
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Well, everyone has their own unique perspective, and everyone s the hero of their own show, right?
0
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So I m sure anyone in the band or the organization will have told you their point of view, and it may differ from mine.
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But having been the leader, namesake, whatever you want to call me,
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I d always had a certain vision and asked others to follow.
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Their opinions and their input was very welcomed, but obviously somebody had to be the quarterback.
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And so I treated this like a team and I was the quarterback, but I knew I couldn t play without a receiver in the line.
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Okay.
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So I wasn t, um, ego driven, but I had to,
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have a plan, stick to the plan, and sink or swim, make the decision.
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So when I did see that the burnout was happening after those two back-to-back records, and this was our first foray into that kind of
1
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because it has happened to me other times in my career.
1
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In this instance, there was a moment in time where I would, in retrospect, blame agents, managers, lawyers, because they were supposed to be the mentors that said, we believe in you, take your time, get it right.
1
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And they allowed us to keep going to the point of burnout.
1
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What I wouldn t allow was it to fall apart because I knew better than to think, wait a minute,
1
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Nobody physically harmed each other.
1
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Nobody stole money.
1
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Nobody sold a girlfriend.
1
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Nobody was dead.
1
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Nobody was, you know, car crashed.
1
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Like, this was burnout.
1
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So you go back to team, you go back to, you know, what is it that got us here collectively?
1
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Let everybody go out and gather their
1
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thoughts, get new information, bring it back to the fold, which in turn could make us stronger.
1
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And I really, by that point, went out on a limb, because at that point I d fired the managers, agents, and lawyers, and said to the guys, I ve got this vision, I believe it still works, and not only
1
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Do I need you guys to come along?
1
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But I m doing it without the rest of the apparatus now.
1
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And they put their faith in that.
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I mean, there s three things that I ve gotten to learn about you through this series that s really inspired me that I feel like you innovated and you led the way with in terms of
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anyone that I m aware of in the kind of the music industry at this high of a level.
1
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And I want to share these three things.
1
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One is during that time where I guess the the band was kind of in a lot of friction, at least from the story of the documentary you brought in as a mediator, a therapist, a coach, someone to kind of like say, hey,
1
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Tell everyone how you feel.
1
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Let s open up all of the emotions, the frustrations, the pains, the joys, and share it all.
1
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And this was, what, 20, 30 years ago or something, right?
1
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30 years ago.
1
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30 years ago, when this wasn t a popular thing to do.
1
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35 years ago.
1
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That was looked down upon 30 years ago.
1
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But you said, I m going to have the courage to say, we need to bring a coach, an expert, a mediator, a therapist to come in and let everyone express themselves.
1
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Would you say that really helped?
1
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Oh, yeah.
1
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Bringing people back together?
1
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Oh, yeah.
1
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And boy, was it resistance.
1
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Really?
1
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Oh, yeah.
1
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You know, I d heard about these therapies, especially in alcoholism and mental illness, you know, and where you go to rehab or, you know, and you re dealing with issues.
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But like I said, we didn t have those issues
1
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We had naivete and youth and this rocket ship to success that was confusing because we went from being the children of our parents to the parents of our parents.
1
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And the parents, we were now these CEOs.
1
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We were now these decision makers.
1
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We were now these money makers.
1
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We were the gravy train.
1
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Life changed for everybody in the organization.
1
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In your 20s.
1
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In my 20s.
1
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And that s me being, I don t know, I don t want to say a visionary, but a different thinker.
1
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I thought differently.
1
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I just always thought differently.
1
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The way I got a record deal.
1
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Nobody gets a record deal the way I got a record deal.
1
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I wouldn t knock down a DJ s booth.
1
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Right now, we think that there s millions of people who are going to watch this interview, which is nothing but ego.
1
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But in truth, it just could be you and I.
1
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And nobody may ever see this or hear this, right?
1
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And we don t know.
1
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The loneliest man in the music business was a DJ, talking to no one, preaching the gospel of music.
1
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And I said, that man loves music more than anyone I know.
1
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I m gonna go knock on his window and play him a song.
1
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It was the same kind of visions I ve had throughout the process here, where I said, self-management.
1
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The industry said, you re out of your mind.
1
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You re a dead man walking.
1
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You re the biggest band in the world right now.
1
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You can t fire your big shot manager. 
1
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I said, why?
1
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I wasn t being egomaniacal.
1
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I said, why?
1
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Give me a good reason why.
1
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There wasn t a good reason why.
1
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And from 1991 to 2016,
1
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It s a lot of commission checks I didn t pay anybody.
1
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But the band trusted me and we did it.
1
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I did it.
1
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I built Bon Jovi Magic.
1
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That s the second thing that I was gonna talk about.
1
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But the therapist, Lou Cox, he come in and he had nothing to win or lose.
1
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He wasn t on anyone s salaries.
1
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He wasn t on the payroll.
1
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He wasn t even in the music business.
1
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Wow.
1
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What was the one thing that he taught you through that experience about mediation, therapy, communication?
1
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Well, little silly elevator bumper stickers like everyone s the star of their own show.
1
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It s five different opinions in this story.
1
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It s five different points of view.
1
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But it was about listening in order to learn.
1
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It was about, you know, giving the floor to others when necessary.
1
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It was about being a shoulder to lean on when somebody, you know, needed that shoulder to lean on.
1
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There was a lot of that, that there was no
1
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It was just, it was all based in truths.
1
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It was looking into someone s eye and saying I love you and meaning it.
1
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Wow.
1
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You know, understanding what the words meant.
1
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Not just, oh, we re performing on this stage together.
1
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Hey, dude.
1
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I was never a dude.
1
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We weren t dude.
1
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I wasn t interested in that.
1
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I was interested in cutting to a deeper place.
1
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You know, our music got lumped into
1
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genre of music because of we when we came up and the kind of stuff you know that I was 21 and 25 I look like every kid in the mall that s the way the kids looked in the mall yeah so we were thrust into that but that s not who I was it was just we were
1
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put into that.
1
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But you were, I mean, again, this is the thing that surprises me.
1
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You re in, this is what, the late 80s, early 90s, right?
1
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Mid-80s.
1
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Mid-80s.
1
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86, 87, 88, you know.
1
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But when the therapy session- Oh, that s 90, yeah, 90, 91, yeah.
1
90, 91.
1
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Yeah.
1
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It s what, five to seven of you guys in a room together.
1
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Yeah.
1
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And you re talking about- Love?
1
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And you re talking about your emotions, and you re talking, I love you, and you re looking in each other s eyes, and you re being vulnerable.
1
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When I grew up in the 80s and 90s, you weren t allowed to do that stuff.
1
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So I m saying, you innovated this ability to, like, how were all of you able to be so receptive to connect openly, lovingly, and vulnerably?
1
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Oh, it wasn t easy.
1
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Nobody was receptive to it.
1
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I was receptive to it.
1
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The guys fought it.
1
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And then after a couple of sessions of it, they, you know, had their private time with Lou, and then they would come back into a group, and then, you know,
1
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We committed to it.
1
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Wow.
1
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We committed to it.
1
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How many sessions did you guys all do together?
1
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Oh, I don t know.
1
SPEAKER_01
You re an idiot.
1
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Let s just put it this way, over the course of time that started in 90 and I was talking to Lou, you know, a year ago.
1
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It s amazing.
1
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So we still, you know, I would still touch base with him over time.
1
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Yeah.
1
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We needed him anytime.
1
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How important was it for you to tap into your relationship skills and your emotional skills?
1
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you know, over your singing and songwriting skills in order to be successful as a group and as a band?
1
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I just looked at it like a family is always going to have its issues.
1
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A team is always going to have their issues.
1
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But having been a sports fan, I could see the inner workings of a team and think
1
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I could see that the ego is prohibiting them from winning championships.
1
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And that a family can t get away from each other because of blood, but they could have nothing more than a common last name.
1
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So there had to be a way to take the strength of a name and the strength of a team and take the best of those things and maximize them.
1
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So if it s based in truth, you can get over ego.
1
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Wow.
1
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It worked for me.
1
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That s incredible.
1
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And it sounds like if you didn t allow, if everyone didn t join in that process, you guys wouldn t be where you are.
1
SPEAKER_01
Well, if somebody could have quit easily, yeah, it sure would have been an easier way for somebody to quit.
1
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But nobody ever quit the band until Richie, you know, in 2013, but that s much later.
1
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But no, no, everybody was committed.
1
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It s incredible, man.
1
SPEAKER_00
So that s cool.
1
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So I loved, you know, one of three things that I really think you innovated.
1
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The second thing, you mentioned it.
1
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1990, you re 29, you re 30 years old, and you say, okay, everyone in the music industry has a
2
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or has agents and all these different things, I m gonna do it differently.
2
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You hear about that now of like independent artists and starting their own thing and launching their music through the internet, but in 1990, like that never happened.
2
SPEAKER_00
So you really innovated and led this way for artists 30 years before they started doing it.
2
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What was the biggest challenge you had to overcome in starting your own management company
2
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navigating the landscape of ticketing and venues and commissions.
2
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What happened was is we let go of the old agent and got a new one, okay?
2
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So it wasn t that I didn t have one.
2
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We got a different one.
2
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Right.
2
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The manager, God bless him, you know, we re still friendly, but he said it was about him.
2
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We went, no, it s definitely not about you.
2
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Then you have to think, what does he bring that is so unique?
2
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And granted, in that first chapter of my career, I learned a lot.
2
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And it was great.
2
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But when it was time to move on, I was glad that it was time to move on.
2
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And it was season.
2
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And the word on the street was, this is career suicide.
2
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But I had an incredible,
2
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representative, and I use that word endearingly, it was way more than a lawyer.
2
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He was the godfather to my daughter.
2
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He was my father and my best friend and my brother all rolled into one.
2
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He never, ever, you know, took advantage of me.
2
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He represented, he taught me everything I know about business.
2
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Wow.
2
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And he s passed, he had frontal lobe dementia and he s passed about
2
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seven, eight, nine years ago now.
2
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There s a huge black hole in my life because he s not in it any longer.
2
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But he s what made me learn everything that I know now.
2
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And in turn, also made me realize we didn t need all that glitz and glamour.
2
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We had an amazing right hand in a guy named Paul Corzelius.
2
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who was doing the day-to-day in the office.
2
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Jerry was doing all the paperwork and I was making all the decisions.
2
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We could do this.
2
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And we did it in a big way.
2
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We had the biggest tour in the world three times in that period.
2
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I had six number one albums.
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I had six number one singles.
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Crushing it.
2
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Yeah, it s incredible.
2
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But how did you have the courage to do that when no one else had done it?
2
SPEAKER_01
I had met with a half a dozen managers I remember at the time or did, you know, like meeting with managers again and going through that process and just not clicking with any of them.
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There was none of them that moved me.
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And I needed somebody that was going to dedicate their life to this the way that we dedicated our lives to it.
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And I wasn t getting that.
2
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Wow.
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So I just, why?
2
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Why?
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Do it ourselves.
2
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Wow.
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It s beautiful.
2
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The third thing that I feel like you ve really innovated in this industry of music and rock star and fame and all these different things
2
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is you got married, you know, at the peak, I think you were in your late 20s, right?
2
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28, 29, when you got married to a high school sweetheart.
2
SPEAKER_00
And for me, I don t know how you re on the road constantly with that much fame, that much success, that much money, that much options, let s say, and you re able to enter a marriage and have a, what looks like on the outside, a healthy relationship for decades.
2
SPEAKER_00
35 years.
2
SPEAKER_00
That s incredible.
2
SPEAKER_00
So I think you ve innovated this in a space where... No, I can t take that credit.
2
SPEAKER_00
Well, I feel like, you know, not many people... There s fewer and far between.
2
SPEAKER_01
Bono s married as long, Bruce is married almost as long.
2
SPEAKER_00
Very, very few.
2
SPEAKER_00
How are you able to have a healthy, successful, thriving marriage and relationship while all the other
2
SPEAKER_00
You know, ego stuff and fame and just travel and success.
2
SPEAKER_01
That one was easy.
2
SPEAKER_01
That didn t take a genius.
2
SPEAKER_01
We grew together.
2
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
2
SPEAKER_01
We went to high school together.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_01
So we came through this whole roller coaster ride together.
2
SPEAKER_01
So no matter my highs or my lows, she s seen them.
2
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
2
SPEAKER_01
And that was integral.
2
SPEAKER_01
She didn t meet me at the pinnacle of my successes or the low points in my career and pick me up out of a gutter somewhere.
2
SPEAKER_01
So we grew up in the same hometown with the same kind of values, same kind of family background, middle class upbringing.
2
SPEAKER_01
She saw you doing cover band stuff.
2
SPEAKER_01
Sure, in high school.
2
SPEAKER_01
So that one I just was, thank God, fortunate enough to get right the first time.
2
SPEAKER_01
And we held on.
2
SPEAKER_01
We never really had any kind of difficulties.
2
SPEAKER_01
Really?
2
SPEAKER_01
It s been 35 years.
2
SPEAKER_00
That s incredible.
2
SPEAKER_00
What do you think is the key, and I m not sure if anyone asked you about relationship or marriage advice ever, but what would you say are the three keys to having a long-term successful relationship while thriving at the top of your career as well?
2
SPEAKER_01
I don t know.
2
SPEAKER_01
I mean, the relationship thing, like I said, is mutual respect.
2
SPEAKER_01
Okay.
2
SPEAKER_01
Admiration and mutual respect is at the top of this for me.
2
SPEAKER_01
To be a good listener and know that it s not all about me.
2
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It s about we.
2
SPEAKER_01
You know, it s about both of us.
2
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It s about all of us.
2
SPEAKER_01
It s about the family dynamic.
2
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So, of course, I m always going to be the, you know, the narcissist
2
SPEAKER_01
the lead singer in the house, but there s no platinum records hanging in my house.
2
SPEAKER_01
We left that a long, long, long time ago in our home.
2
SPEAKER_01
So admiration, mutual admiration, society, being a good listener, growing together, just finding her
2
SPEAKER_01
in a way that, like, I get excited in the morning when I see her, every single day.
2
SPEAKER_01
35 years later, I get excited every single day.
2
SPEAKER_01
What s the thing you love about her the most?
2
SPEAKER_01
That she absolutely knows that she loves me, like, with all of her heart.
2
SPEAKER_01
You know, I mean, there s just there s no question.
2
SPEAKER_01
There s no doubt.
2
SPEAKER_01
There s not even a glimmer of doubt There s not even a hint of a glimmer of doubt that this is it.
2
SPEAKER_01
There is no that s it Wow.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I got this one, right?
2
SPEAKER_00
when you re coming off stage in front of 80,000 people and you re the man and you re selling out the biggest tour in history back-to-back and people are screaming every word and chanting your name and then you go home and
2
SPEAKER_00
someone s upset at you or they want you to listen to them, how do you get over your ego of being Jon Bon Jovi and saying, I want to be a great partner?
2
SPEAKER_01
It might take a minute to walk it off, you know, when you re on the road for a long time, especially in those younger years when we would be on the road so long that you could carry the lifestyle home.
2
SPEAKER_01
But I haven t even seen that guy in a long time.
2
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
2
SPEAKER_01
So it s of no interest to me to even see that guy.
2
SPEAKER_01
It really isn t.
2
SPEAKER_01
Boy, I m really trying to be honest with you because even if it was 10 or 15 years ago when we were just still a little more
2
SPEAKER_01
Wild and in it and I don t mean this and it would like we re subdued now, but it s just in a little more Ego driven way.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yes Even that wasn t a big deal.
2
SPEAKER_00
Really?
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I just what did you learn that though?
2
SPEAKER_01
Did you did your parents?
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SPEAKER_01
It s who we are where we come from what we did.
2
SPEAKER_01
Um, I I was never a big drug guy.
2
SPEAKER_01
I was never the big drinking guy.
2
SPEAKER_01
I was never the big
2
SPEAKER_01
You know, one thing we learned on this journey, we re doing this interview right now in Los Angeles, California.
2
SPEAKER_01
I had a house out here for years on the beach in Malibu with all the beautiful people.
2
SPEAKER_01
And the first thing after owning that house for four or five years was we got to sell this house.
2
SPEAKER_01
Why?
2
SPEAKER_01
We got to get the hell out of here.
2
SPEAKER_01
This is not conducive to
2
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a great relationship and a great life and a great career and a great grounded who we are, what we are, where we come from.
2
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
2
SPEAKER_01
And it was the same thing when we went home and
2
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road slippery when wet, it was like we are being lumped in with these kind of bands that it s not our thing.
2
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And I was just like, I said, I don t want to be a part of this scene.
2
SPEAKER_01
This is not who we are.
2
SPEAKER_01
It s not who I am.
2
SPEAKER_01
I don t give a right.
2
SPEAKER_01
Go back home.
2
SPEAKER_01
Take that picture in the inner sleeve in a driveway, you know, in our cars, you know, with blue jeans and T-shirts on and sell that Malibu house.
2
SPEAKER_01
And you come out here and
2
SPEAKER_01
Everyone s always looking over the shoulder and they ve got that, who s the bigger guy in the room?
2
SPEAKER_01
Who can I go and work?
2
SPEAKER_01
Who can I get something from?
2
SPEAKER_01
I gave that up so long ago.
2
SPEAKER_01
I give up about it.
2
SPEAKER_01
I m not impressed.
2
SPEAKER_01
I don t give up.
3
SPEAKER_01
That shallow s*** will ruin you.
3
SPEAKER_01
And I know grown men who still are playing that game.
3
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
3
SPEAKER_01
You know, and it s just sad.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_01
And shallow.
3
SPEAKER_01
What do you wish everyone knew about money, fame, and success?
3
SPEAKER_01
Money doesn t make you smart, it just makes you rich.
3
SPEAKER_01
Does it make you happy?
3
SPEAKER_01
Does not make you happy.
3
SPEAKER_01
Now, can it pay for the bills so you can get the doctor and the insurance and those things?
3
SPEAKER_01
It solves some problems, but absolutely does not make you happy and it doesn t make you smart.
3
SPEAKER_01
It just makes you wealthy.
3
SPEAKER_01
What do you wish people knew about fame and accomplishments?
3
SPEAKER_01
accomplishments are all fabulous especially if you worked hard for them and you know you have a you deserve the opportunity to to accept the accolade in and of the moment and
3
SPEAKER_01
Enjoy it, and then you move on from it, and don t measure who and what you are based on any kind of championship ring.
3
SPEAKER_00
Right, that s not your identity.
3
SPEAKER_01
It is not who you are, it s just what you do.
3
SPEAKER_01
And I too, I live by that credo.
3
SPEAKER_01
It s not who I am, it s just what I do.
3
SPEAKER_01
But I ve met many a billionaire who, they re not smart, because they re just,
3
SPEAKER_01
they re missing out on the good things in life.
3
SPEAKER_01
On being a part of their community, on touching the lives of their wives and their children, on sleeping on their pillow at night and knowing that they did something good instead of for a buck.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_00
And what do you wish people knew about fame?
3
SPEAKER_01
It s really an interesting question to ask at this juncture, right?
3
SPEAKER_01
It s 2024, and I remember having a conversation with my kids maybe 10, 12, 15 years ago.
3
SPEAKER_01
And I m telling me about the internet and ways to make money.
3
SPEAKER_01
And I would say, but you gotta write a song to make money.
3
SPEAKER_01
You have to learn how to act.
3
SPEAKER_01
You know, we re talking about by the arts, referencing the arts.
3
SPEAKER_01
Or you have to be an athlete and put in the 10,000 hours.
3
SPEAKER_01
I ve been proven wrong, obviously, now, right?
3
SPEAKER_01
There s a whole world of people making a buck, and that is very confusing for me and my generation.
3
SPEAKER_01
It s very confusing for me and my generation.
3
SPEAKER_01
We were told that we could go to the moon, because President Kennedy told us we could, but we had to go to school to learn how to do the science to get to the moon.
3
SPEAKER_01
Hey, we didn t just, you know, snap our fingers and get lucky on the internet one day.
3
SPEAKER_01
So it s a very confusing time.
3
SPEAKER_01
Um, but I don t, I don t think anything is a substitute for hard work and dedication and commitment and
3
SPEAKER_01
You know, not every day you re gonna win, but every day is an opportunity to participate in the process and measure your progress.
3
SPEAKER_00
Absolutely.
3
SPEAKER_00
Well, you won a lot, though, consistently, which was pretty impressive.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, it s all good.
3
SPEAKER_00
You won... More than I ve lost.
3
SPEAKER_00
You ve been winning, yeah.
3
SPEAKER_00
More than I ve lost.
3
SPEAKER_00
Championship after championship.
3
SPEAKER_00
And, again, we re talking about Thank You, Good Night, the Bon Jovi story, which is on Hulu, at the time of watching this.
3
SPEAKER_00
And I m curious about
3
SPEAKER_00
You put in a lot of reps.
3
SPEAKER_00
Speaking of 10,000 hours, when you were a kid, you were doing cover band stuff in Jersey.
3
SPEAKER_00
And there s an amazing scene of Bruce Springsteen coming up on stage while you were singing his song and him singing it with you.
3
SPEAKER_00
And I can only imagine the electricity and the excitement in your body as a 16, 17-year-old seeing someone who is bigger than you on stage.
3
SPEAKER_00
who is singing with you.
3
SPEAKER_00
And you talk about, like, you could almost touch it.
3
SPEAKER_00
You re explaining, like, how you could almost reach out and touch this opportunity.
3
SPEAKER_00
And you just want to get closer and closer to that by being in the production studios and being on stages and being around these great artists and talent.
3
SPEAKER_00
I m curious, where did your creativity come from?
3
SPEAKER_00
How did you, and when you ever felt like blocked creatively or burnt out, how did you get into a creative state?
3
SPEAKER_01
I was never the great singer, the great guitar player, the great poet.
3
SPEAKER_01
I was the hardest working singer, guitar player, and poet.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_01
And so that was a big part of how I became me.
3
SPEAKER_01
If I was gonna,
3
SPEAKER_01
drown, it was going to be of my own doing.
3
SPEAKER_01
Right?
3
SPEAKER_01
So that was, that was integral to the story.
3
SPEAKER_01
Also, what was integral to my personal story was that the drinking age was 18 and it sounds comedic, but it s true because at 16 you could slip into a bar.
3
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
3
SPEAKER_01
Every 16 year old thinks he s going to be a pro athlete, a rock and roll star, an astronaut, you know?
3
SPEAKER_01
So you could go in there and say, I m going to do this.
3
SPEAKER_01
Golly gee, you know?
3
SPEAKER_01
And
3
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any little spark was enough to think that you could go to the next level and the next level and the next level.
3
SPEAKER_01
I was then fortunate enough that by 2021 I did write the song and knock on the DJ s booth and the creative guy in me said how to get a record deal, how to then hire a band,
3
SPEAKER_01
Um, that was unique to the guy that was the harder worker.
3
SPEAKER_01
Right.
3
SPEAKER_01
You know?
3
SPEAKER_01
Because you could go down in the Jersey Shore when cover bands were making $3,000 a night in 1979, 80, 81.
3
SPEAKER_01
That s real money.
3
SPEAKER_01
We were making $100 in an original band to split between everybody, if you were lucky.
3
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
3
SPEAKER_01
If you were lucky.
3
SPEAKER_01
If you were lucky.
3
SPEAKER_01
Because oftentimes you d play for free because it was original music.
3
SPEAKER_01
So I never made any money, but I didn t need it because I was 16, 17, 18.
3
SPEAKER_01
I was able to live at home.
3
SPEAKER_01
And for me, that is a big part of the success was right time, right place, born at a certain time, you know.
3
SPEAKER_01
Not privileged, but food on the table, shoes on my feet, and two parents, and they were supportive.
3
SPEAKER_01
All good things.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_00
So all of those things helped.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, of course.
3
SPEAKER_00
The way you re explaining yourself, you know, not the best at all these different things, but the hardest worker, you kind of sound like the Tom Brady of rock and roll.
3
SPEAKER_00
You know, it s like, you re like the Tom Brady of rock.
3
SPEAKER_00
You re like not the best at all these things, but you willed yourself to become the best, and championship after championship after championship.
3
SPEAKER_00
I don t know if that resonates with you at all.
3
SPEAKER_01
It does resonate with me because Tom, Kobe, LeBron, guys of this era, that s kind of the work ethic that I think that I have or always had.
3
SPEAKER_00
You know, yeah.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_00
I mean, we had Kobe.
3
SPEAKER_00
I got to interview Kobe on the show before he passed and just learned so much from him in that short interview.
3
SPEAKER_00
You know, I know you have a relationship with a lot of the great athletes.
3
SPEAKER_00
You owned a sports team at one point, the arena football team, but I think you said you have a relationship with Tom as well.
3
SPEAKER_00
You ve interacted with him over the years.
3
SPEAKER_00
What would you say is the greatest thing you learned from Tom Brady about how he pursued his craft and how it applied to your craft?
3
SPEAKER_01
I ve observed Tom closely, and I would like to think that I could call him my friend.
3
SPEAKER_01
I mean, he s been to my house many times, and I go to practices, and we talk on the phone and stuff.
3
SPEAKER_01
Here s a guy that s much younger than me that I m learning from, which I really appreciate, too, because, you know, 199 in the sixth round and all that kind of stuff, and the audacity to tell Mr. Craft, you know, I m the best thing you ve ever done, and to have a coach like Belichick on him and never giving him all the accolades he could have easily let go to his own head.
3
SPEAKER_01
kept him working but I think that we carried that being from New Jersey as a band for the longest time it was like even with the accolades we ll show you and like Dorothy would say that I would just will things and and by sheer will people would follow you if you led by example and I didn t ask you know that
3
SPEAKER_01
that this had to be this way or my way or the highway, but nobody ever said, I m out of here because of hard work.
3
SPEAKER_01
They just did everything too and gave everything they had too.
3
SPEAKER_01
Don t think for a moment that Richie and David and Tico didn t give everything they had, because they did.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, they did.
3
SPEAKER_01
You have this amazing
4
SPEAKER_00
quote in the docuseries that I want to just read back to you that you said.
4
SPEAKER_00
At 25, all I was thinking about was fun and success.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_00
At 30, I got married and looked at success differently.
4
SPEAKER_00
By 40, start to measure if you accomplish what you set out to.
4
SPEAKER_00
By 50, you start to think about a legacy.
4
SPEAKER_00
By 60, as the Chinese proverb says,
4
SPEAKER_00
You are the man you re meant to be.
4
SPEAKER_00
So at 60, when I look back, did I become the man I wanted to be?
4
SPEAKER_00
I m curious, do you feel like you ve become that?
4
SPEAKER_00
I think it s a work in progress.
4
SPEAKER_01
But I m not disappointed by anything that I ve done.
4
SPEAKER_01
And I ve had very few regrets, which I m really proud to be able to say.
4
SPEAKER_01
I ve had loss.
4
SPEAKER_01
I ve had physical ailments.
4
SPEAKER_01
I ve had victories, and I ve had defeats.
4
SPEAKER_01
I m very proud of the legacy thus far.
4
SPEAKER_01
I haven t done anything to f*** it up.
4
SPEAKER_01
As I said, I m only here to sell the truth.
4
SPEAKER_01
And it s blemished, but it s real.
4
SPEAKER_00
If you could go back to your younger self in your 20s or early 30s,
4
SPEAKER_00
and you could only give yourself three pieces of advice, and you know everything that you know now.
4
SPEAKER_00
You re just going back in time, and you re speaking to your younger self, late 20s, early 30s.
4
SPEAKER_00
With everything that you ve experienced, what three things would you say to that younger John?
4
SPEAKER_01
I think there s, I don t even know that there s three.
4
SPEAKER_01
I would say take time to enjoy it more.
4
SPEAKER_01
Don t lose faith in yourself even when
4
SPEAKER_01
you feel like you re maybe down for the last time, you know?
4
SPEAKER_01
And the eight count is going to nine.
4
SPEAKER_01
And to believe in the power of we.
4
SPEAKER_01
I think that those three things is probably what I would say.
4
SPEAKER_00
If you could jump in time 30 years from now,
4
SPEAKER_00
And imagine you would get to accomplish everything and live the life that you want to live for the next 30 years.
4
SPEAKER_00
And just imagine you re in that state of wisdom.
4
SPEAKER_00
What three pieces of advice would you give your younger self as you are today from that future self, if that makes sense?
4
SPEAKER_01
Well, 90 looking back on 60, you know, I guess I would probably say, did you live up to the,
4
SPEAKER_01
the code that you set, you know, for yourself and for others and now for the next generation.
4
SPEAKER_01
So with my kids, you know, that if I can see them becoming
4
SPEAKER_01
members of society that were contributing something positively, then that will have been a victory.
4
SPEAKER_01
Because it s not about fame or fortune or anything else that goes with it.
4
SPEAKER_01
I think it goes back to, did you leave something behind worthy of having been here?
4
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
4
SPEAKER_01
So, that to me right now as I sit here and I think about where my kids are because they re all grown, I m not thinking about me anymore.
4
SPEAKER_01
I sort of feel like I ve
4
SPEAKER_01
I ve achieved the highest highs.
4
SPEAKER_01
What I hope with this record and this film is that it s going to say, hey,
4
SPEAKER_01
Good mile marker, the 40th, and by the way, this new album s pretty darn good.
4
SPEAKER_01
But it s not gonna be Slippery When Wet again.
4
SPEAKER_01
I m 62 years old, it s time for the next generation to have their Slippery When Wet.
4
SPEAKER_01
But I would like to think that my next Slippery When Wet could be, did my kids make any kind of contributions to the world?
4
SPEAKER_01
That would be neat.
4
SPEAKER_01
That s beautiful.
4
SPEAKER_00
What is,
4
SPEAKER_00
Being a father taught you about life.
4
SPEAKER_01
You don t know shit.
4
SPEAKER_01
Man, from the minute that we... I remember, you know, our first child was our daughter, and I didn t have sisters, let alone a baby.
4
SPEAKER_01
When the door closed on that first night, we were like, there s no owner s manual that comes with this.
4
SPEAKER_01
You re like, wow.
4
SPEAKER_01
So you figure it all out.
4
SPEAKER_01
Okay, step at a time, and you get it, and you work hard at it.
4
SPEAKER_01
And with every child, and then with every chapter of every child, the playbook changed.
4
SPEAKER_01
And with their girls to boys, and then toddlers to teens, and then teens to adults, and adults getting married.
4
SPEAKER_01
Nobody told me about these chapters in the book.
4
SPEAKER_01
And I m like, you would think that by now somebody would inform me about these chapters.
4
SPEAKER_01
But no one had told me about these chapters.
4
SPEAKER_01
And they re all different.
4
SPEAKER_01
So, you know, we re just trying to navigate it.
4
SPEAKER_01
And now all my friends that are my age go, oh yeah, yeah, yeah.
4
SPEAKER_01
Didn t we tell you?
4
SPEAKER_01
I m like, fuck you, man.
4
SPEAKER_01
No, you didn t tell me.
4
SPEAKER_00
What is a lyric from one of your songs that you ve written that really speaks to you of your season of life right now?
4
SPEAKER_00
Oh my god.
4
SPEAKER_01
You re catching me off guard.
4
SPEAKER_01
I m not usually good at this, but there s a song on the new album.
4
SPEAKER_01
It s called Hollow Man.
4
SPEAKER_01
It says, what do you sing when the song s been sung?
4
SPEAKER_01
Who do you fight when the war is won?
4
SPEAKER_01
What do you write when your book is done?
4
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
4
SPEAKER_01
What do you sing when the song s been sung?
4
SPEAKER_01
Here I am, the hollow man, telling stories about the promise of a promised land.
4
SPEAKER_01
I feel like a cheap bouquet of flowers in a one-night stand.
4
SPEAKER_01
With my heart in my hand, I am the hollow man.
4
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
4
SPEAKER_01
It s saying I m an empty vessel.
4
SPEAKER_01
I m here looking up at the sky and saying, okay, Lord, what s next?
4
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
4
SPEAKER_01
And so that s just a song on the new album.
4
SPEAKER_01
That s on the new album.
4
SPEAKER_01
That comes out June 7th.
4
SPEAKER_01
June 7th.
4
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
4
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, Hollow Man s a story of me today.
4
SPEAKER_01
Did you find the answer to that?
4
SPEAKER_01
No.
4
SPEAKER_01
I m living it.
4
SPEAKER_01
Every day is an opportunity to write a song, but I don t often take every day and turn it on.
4
SPEAKER_01
As a matter of fact, at times I have to turn it off and just acknowledge that it ll be there next time I want to turn the faucet on.
4
SPEAKER_01
But because it becomes so overwhelming, if you run the course of a cycle,
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with the joy that I ve found with this record, it was time to say, OK, it s being repetitive.
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It s time to shut off the faucet.
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OK, here s a new album.
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It s called Forever.
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These lessons won t be manifest.
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They re manifested, but they won t be fully learned for the next two years.
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Wow.
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And then I ll look back on them.
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And then I ll know where I was.
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That s smart for you.
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you know, 44 decades plus of doing music, you ve had to kind of like reinvent your identity almost every decade or every couple of albums or every few years, um, while keeping, you know, your roots, but innovating, you know, music and things like that.
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But recently you went through surgery on your vocal cords and it s throughout the documentary series when people can watch it and
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You know, I can relate to this in my own way of being an athlete and getting injured and my whole identity, my entire life being tied into being talented and being valuable and being able to use my skill sets to go make something happen of my dreams and my vision, right?
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But then when I got injured playing in a sport that you were an owner of, of another team, playing arena football,
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That vision of my identity and my future became shattered literally and emotionally and spiritually.
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And it was a year and a half of recovery and trying to figure out, okay, what do I do next?
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Who am I of this next season of life?
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What is my next chapter?
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What is my next song?
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What is my next play if I m not able to play that game anymore?
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In your journey of, you know,
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your vocal cords not being the exact same in your 20s at 60, how have you mentally and emotionally dealt with the identity shifts and changes as an artist and as a man?
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You and I were talking off-camera about that period between when you stopped playing the game that you loved and determining that you were gonna be here, which probably was not in the cards... Was not.
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...in 2008.
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Was not.
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You never dreamt of this.
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But I m going to guesstimate that you re pretty satisfied with where you are right now.
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I m very satisfied.
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So look at that.
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And it needed to happen in order for me to get on this trajectory.
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The obstacle is the way, right?
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Exactly.
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And I get that.
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I trust there was a period of mourning for you.
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Big time.
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Because from the time you were eight until you were 23, 24, you were identified by the game.
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And then there comes that morning and confusion.
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I haven t had to quit doing what I m doing, nor would I ever have to stop writing a song or making a record.
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But if I chose not to go out and tour again because I couldn t be at that level I am accustomed to performing at, I do wonder how I ll behave.
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But I haven t come to that crossroad.
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I hope you don t have to.
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I hope I don t have to either.
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If, God forbid, that is my future,
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The one thing I will know is I ve exhausted every possible way back onto the playing field at the level that I m accustomed to playing at.
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So when Kobe had the injury, when Tommy had the injury, when Michael Strahan ripped his back off of his chest, you know, when every athlete goes through this, the question is, okay, I can get back on the playing field, can I play in the Super Bowl?
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You know, can I win again?
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At the level of what I m capable of, yeah.
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And I don t know the answer.
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So I m a work in progress.
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How is that uncertainty?
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How are you dealing with that right now?
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It s better than it was, because I m a really analytical guy when it comes down to it.
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And I look at pictures of the chords and the progress, and I m optimistic about it.
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Of your actual vocal cords.
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Yeah, I see them all the time.
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So you see there s improvement.
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Yeah.
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But if it s not up to speed, let s
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say this, you know, and I hate to even put it out in the world, that I don t tour.
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I can promise you, Louis, that I will be able to say, I did do it at the highest level for the longest time.
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And I m good with that.
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Because one thing that I know that I ve told myself since I was 25 was I will never be on the Where Are They Now tour, you know, playing in the train station at the, you know,
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diner and the buffet on Friday evening.
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It s just not going to happen.
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So I will be more than okay with that aspect.
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You ll be at peace if you don t get the tour again.
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If I don t have the opportunity, which I really would enjoy the opportunity, I ll live with it because I m still capable of writing a record.
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I m still capable of recording a record.
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That s cool.
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I just need to be able to do two and a half hours a night, four nights a week.
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And if, God forbid, that doesn t happen, I can absolutely, positively guarantee you, you will never see me giving 50%.
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That s out of the question.
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Wow.
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Well, I hope the world gets to see you perform on stage again.
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And if you re coming to LA, I got to go.
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So I m going to find a way to get there for sure.
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Thanks, that d be easy.
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And check it out.
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I ve only got about five more minutes with you, to be respectful of your time.
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And I want people to watch this docu-series.
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It s called Thank You, Good Night, the Bon Jovi story.
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It s on Hulu.
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So make sure you guys go watch this.
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It s fascinating.
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If you love art, if you love music, if you love John, if you love just creativity, you know, ups and downs of success stories, you re gonna love this series.
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So make sure you watch this.
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And if you really want to study
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your mind and the vision that you had and the drive that you had to will your vision into existence.
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It is a beautiful story.
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So make sure you watch this.
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Even if you don t like music, you ll be inspired by this story and your vision of bringing your heart and putting it on for the world to see.
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So I really am inspired by that.
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You got the new album as well, June 7th that people can get.
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What s the best place for them to get that?
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It s streamed everywhere these days, press a button.
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So any Spotify, Amazon, and everybody s going to have it.
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Awesome.
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Before I ask the final couple questions, what else can we do to be of service to you today?
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I don t know, unless you have a magical mystery cure.
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for the high Cs of the vocal chords.
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One of the things that you do, which I think is really cool as well, is you re all about service.
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You ve got a charitable foundation as well.
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You want to give back.
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So many things you ll see in the docuseries about you wanting to be of service with your music, with your platform, with your fame.
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And I think that s really cool.
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So people can learn more about that as well.
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This question, final two questions, this one is called the three truths.
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So I ve already asked you a couple hypothetical questions, but this is another one for you.
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Imagine you do get to live as long as you want to live.
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You get to keep performing as long as you want to perform.
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You get to do it all.
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You see your kids grow up even more, all the different things that happen in life.
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But for whatever reason, it s your last day on earth, many years away.
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Live as long as you want.
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And in this hypothetical scenario, you have to take all of your music with you.
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You have to take all of your writing with you.
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This conversation is no longer here.
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Any piece of content you ve put out into this world, it goes with you.
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It s a hypothetical scenario.
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It goes with you.
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It goes with you, or it s just not.
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You take it with you?
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You take it with you, or it s not in this world.
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It goes somewhere else.
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We don t have access to it.
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OK.
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Hypothetical.
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So we don t get to hear your music anymore.
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OK.
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But on this last day, you get to leave behind three truths.
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And that s what we do get to keep from you, are these three lessons.
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Um, they could be lyrics from a song.
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It could be something on your heart right now.
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It could be something simple, something, whatever it might be.
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But if it s the last day and you only get to share three lessons with the world, three truths, what would those three truths be for you?
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Wow.
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Live your truths without compromise.
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be of service and take the time to see the world around you,
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Be one with the world around you.
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See the clouds in the sky.
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See that the sun is shining.
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See that the waves are crashing.
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See that the traffic is rolling by.
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Just take the time to smell the roses.
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Yeah, that s really important.
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Too many of us run through life missing every sign of what was there for your pleasure.
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And so many of us were all self-absorbed and consumed and didn t serve anything other than self.
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And so many of us lived a false life of
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what others wanted us to do and be.
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And I think that all of those things are just a waste of this moment in time that we were all given here.
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Well, before I ask the final question, John, I would acknowledge you again for being of service to humanity through your talent, your art, and your heart.
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And, you know, I love what you just said about
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not making it all about self, but also making it about service.
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And I think that s a beautiful life.
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So I wanna acknowledge you for speaking that and sharing that with people because I think a lot of people today just want to be successful and be famous and make it about them.
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So I think it s really cool that you re making it about service and that s one of your truths.
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My final question for you, John, you answered this a little bit earlier, but I d love to hear if it s evolved.
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What is your definition of greatness?
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Boy, with my brain spinning in my head.
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What is my definition of greatness?
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Greatness... is being comfortable in your own skin.
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Greatness is leaving something that is worthy behind.
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Yeah.
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I think I ll just leave it there.
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John, thanks so much for being here.
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Thanks, Lewis.
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Appreciate it, man.
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This was a joy.
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you on your journey towards greatness.
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Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a full rundown of today s episode with all the important links.
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And if you want weekly exclusive bonus episodes with me personally, as well as ad free listening, then make sure to subscribe to our greatness plus channel
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exclusively on Apple Podcasts.
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Share this with a friend on social media and leave us a review on Apple Podcasts as well.
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Let me know what you enjoyed about this episode in that review.
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I really love hearing feedback from you and it helps us figure out how we can support and serve you moving forward.
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And I want to remind you if no one has told you lately that you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter.
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And now it s time to go out there and do something great.