Hall of Fame

Being inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2018 was a dream come true for Jon Bon Jovi - and long overdue.

April 14, 2018, was a very special day for Jon Bon Jovi. It ws the day a lifelong dream was fulfilled when he and his band were inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.

Jon - and his fans - felt the honor was long overdue. By any metric, Bon Jovi is one of the most successful rock bands of all time. They have sold more than 130 million albums and performed over 2,700 concerts worldwide, leaving smiles almost as big as Jon's on the faces of more than 34 million people. The band has also won one or more categories in every major music award from the American Music Awards to the MTV Video Music Awards to the Grammys.

Despite all those indisputable achievements, there are still critics who dismiss Bon Jovi - and especially Jon - as lucky. It's always been that way,and it starts with Jon's good looks.

When Jon first made the cover of Rolling Stone in 1987, he was ecstatic. But the excitement soon turned to disappointment when the story kept going on about his appearance, totally ignoring his music or the album that he believed truly marked his band's arrival, Slippery When Wet. The cover line perfectly summed up what many thought Jon was all about: "Hot Throb."

Jon was deeply offended by the marginalization. As he later told Interview magazine, "I was very angry about all of that. But what could I do? Scar my face? Knock my teeth out? After a while, I learned if they're going to say all I am is a pretty face, then they're not taking the time to look at the facts, which speak for themselves."

The facts that Jon was talking about - hit records, sold-out concerts - were all measurements of enormous popularity. But this was also the fuel that made Bon Jovi an easy target for naysayers.

At the peak of the band's popularity, Bon Jovi was dangerously close to falling into the abyss due to overexposure. It had happened before in rock history - most notably in the late 1970s when it was decided that "too much disco" meant the Bee Gees needed to go away and be rejected as uncool, no matter how many records they had sold.

By the early '90s, when hair metal bands started falling out of favor, the very network that rode their success - MTV - took mean swipes at the entire genre on its hit cartoon show Beavis and Butt-Head. The brunt of the blows, which included snarky commentary over hair metal music videos, was absorbed by the band Winger. But Bon Jovi did not go unscathed, with Butt-Head speaking for a lot of people who grew tired of seeing the band do so well when he told Beavis: "If you say one more good thing about Bon Jovi, I'm gonna really smack the bejesus out of you."

True to his Jersey roots, Jon was tough enough to take it. Then he counter-punched against his critics by growing, maturing and reinventing himself - in music and beyond - without ever abandoning the people who support him.

"[Bon Jovi has] been very smart about adapting to the times, but also adapting to the age of their fans," author Bryan Reesman told Forbes magazine while promoting his book, Bon Jovi: The Story. "You probably listened to some of the metal I listened to growing up. A lot of these bands haven't changed. Maybe it's cool that there's all these bands that are still doing it. But is it really the same being a 50-year-old guy writing raunchy rock and roll about doing drugs and getting laid? It doesn't make sense. And yet, Jon can get away with doing things like that. 'Bad Medicine' feels like a raunchy song, but lyrically, it's not that raunchy. You could still kind of relate to it as a 40-year-old."

Being inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame was the ultimate validatin for Jon and the band. They were finally given legitimacy and acknowledged as one of the all-time greatest acts in music history.

The Hall of Fame ceremony also brought about a cathartic moment for Jon. For the first time since his abrupt departure in 2013, Richie Sambora performed with Bon Jovi. The performance brought the band one step closer to closure, if not reconciliation. As Jon explained to GQ, "In a strange way my forgiveness for Richie allowed me to grow, and David to grow, and Tico to grow into who we are today. Because we were forced down a different road. You don't blame someone for that, you sort of have to say thank you, because it helps you continue your little journey. Sometimes someone has to get off an exit in order for you to continue."

Bon Jovi's 2020, released in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, is a clear example of how Jon has changed as a songwriter and as a person. Older and wiser, Jon's no longer looking to create teen anthems like "You Give Love a Bad Name." He's embraced philanthropy and charitable causes, and hot-button contemporary social issues are at the forefront of his mind. "American Reckoning," for example, reflects on the murder of George Floyd and the Black Lives Matter movement. "Lower the Flag" is based on the recent increase in gun violence and school shootings. "Blood in the Water" is about migrants and the challenges they face in their search for a better life. Jon also wrote a COVID-themed track called "Do What You Can."

"Unbroken" began when Jon was asked to write a song about PTSD in soldiers for a documentary film called To Be of Service. Though his parents met in the Marines, it was a topic he was unfamiliar with, and he was initially torn about getting involved. But after deciding to meet the challenge, Jon did a deep dive into the subject. When he finished writing the song, he presented an iPhone demo recording of himself singing it with an acoustic guitar to the film's director, Josh Aronson. Jon immediately received Aronson's approval. Then Jon sent the recording to the soldiers, and their reaction was, in Jon's words, "everything I had hoped for. Because I wanted them to feel proud of the song."

Positive moments of pride is a great way to sum up what Jon feels now, as he nears the age of 60. He's aged gracefully. No cosmetic surgery, no Botox, no hair transplants and no dye jobs. "Let me tell you, I've earned this gray hair," he told USA Today while promoting 2020. "I've been through enough hurting and healing to be here."

He has no plans to stop performing, writing songs or recording. With nothing left to prove, his motives are simple: "Honestly, at this point, what I'm hoping to do is to first and foremost enjoy it, and then keep integrity," he told USA Today. "I don't ever want to be on the "Where are they now?" pile."

As for the future, Jon Bon Jovi is not finished chasing his ever-evolving dreams. Having achieved success in music, entertainment, business and philanthropy, it's impossible to know where inspiration might lead him next.

"I'm not old enough to start thinking about mortality." he told GQ. "But the idea that we're not the kid in the room anymore - 48, 58 - you're sort of accomplishing or have accomplished the great things that you're gonna do, and that's all well and good, but what matters more is what you're building with your family. Because those two chapters, you can't f--k up either one of those or they're gonna scar you. Fix those circumstances and get them right now, [then] start writing your own chpaters. Live with them. Make them something worth reading again."

When asked by 60 Minutes Australia what chapter of the Jon Bon Jovi storybook he's currently at, Jon said: "I don't know, that's the beauty of it. We're just ... a little more than halfway there."

It's a perspective Jon wears well because it comes from a place of gratitude and contentment. He has never forgotten how the journey started, and how much work and sacrifice it took to reach the fortunate place where he is today - not only from him, but from all the peoole who have supported and loved him over the years. "It's a gift that God gives you the job you wanted when you were a kid, and that I get to do it still," he says. "I'm the luckiest man in the world."

Shared from Limited Edition magazine: JON BON JOVI : HOW A KID FROM NEW JERSEY BECAME A ROCK 'N' ROLL LEGEND