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but it's the Madison Sguare Garden State when it comes to churning out musicians. "The closeness to New York City probably has a lot to do with the rock scene in Jersey," Bon Jovi figures. "All through high school, there were a zillion bands. They formed their own little gangs; either you were in or you weren't." What made Bon Jovi stand out, saYing lBon Jo-Yee.' " Could be apparently, were two things: hard worse. One of his closest chums is work and the ability to sleep sitting the rock musician redubbed "Aldo up. "Other bands would rehearse for Nova," a professional moniker that a while, then quit for beers and go sounds nothing like Aldo to party downtown. With my bands, I Caporushio, his name by birth. was always the slavedriver. You set your goals and that's that." He does Bon Jovi borrowed his guitarist/ synth-player buddy from Nova's own admit, "l'll never be a great guitarist, record label to help season his but l'm a singer, first, a songwriter debut album, Bon Jovi. lronically, and an entertainer when you come another paisan on the LP is coright down to it. That's what I producer Tony Bongiovi, a secondwanted to be from the very first time cousin by Jovi's estimation: "l I ever got up on a stage, and that's honestly didn't know him until I was all I've pushed myself toward. 19," maintains the 23-year-old "l used to sneak into the clubs vocalist. He didn't know a relative in when I was 16, and started playing the music business? "We have a in them when I was 17, 18. The pretty big family,." he says. reason I wear sunglasses all the The family is one which, strangely time is that I'd play till three in the enough, lent support to a kid who morning, so I had to doze off sitting obviously wasn't going to grow up to at my desk in school. The glasses be Mario Lanza. Bon Jovi had his would hide my eyes. lt's a good share of scoffing uncles and girlthing I had teachers who underfriends' fathers-after his first, stood," he concedes after a mopre-high school talent show, for inment's thought, "'cause I could've stance, already people were telling seriously flunked high school." him to give up on show business, Somehow he didn't, though, gnd he recalls-but the bug was in things coalesced for Bon Jovi in his genes. such early groups as the 10-piece "My father at one time tried to be Expressway, a Southside Johnnya singer: He pursued it for a short esque ensemble with plenty of period of tirne, and he really had a horns, and the all-originals band, good voice, but that never evolved The Rest. Expressway did the bar into a career. My mom was a circuit ("We thought we were so Playboy bunny around '62, one of cool, playing clubs and not high the first, and she was on the thresh- school dances, but we lost a lot of old of the entertainment busimoney that way") and Bon Jovi says ness. So both my parents have that he attracted the attention first been supportive." of Billy Squier, and then Southside The junior Bon Jovi's voice on Johnny Lyons himself. Bon Jovi probably is nothing like his "l've always been thrown into father's. Consciously tough, but not these situations where I've had exto the point of rock 'n' roll pgsturcellent people looking over me," Bon ing, Bon Jovi's voice lells rather Jovi reflects, "but Southside's been than merely hinting. The confidence the greatest, even giving me opening is a result not only of his nature, but dates when he could've gotten of a goodly bit of vocal training as somebody who would've helped sell * well. No, the man didn't go to tickets." Few producer-performers, Julliard, but he did graduate from even the most successful, give their one of the most vibrant musical col- charges- potential rivals-that leges around: the New Jersey beach- much exposure. and-bar scene. Jersey may be the Something was in the air, connecGarilen State for its vegetable farms, tions or luck or whatever, and the

BY FRANK LOVECE

aSFlon Jovi" does not mean ll "good morning." The Americanization of singer Jon Bongiovi's name means only that people can pronounce it. Or sometimes, anyway. "The name change wa$ done here (at PolyGram Records) for the phonetics," explains Bon, uh, Jovi. "And people still mispronounce it,

yet-unsigned band oBened a Madison Square Garden show for ZZ Top. "That first time at the Garden," remembers Bon Jovi, "my father the singer looked at his kid and said, 'yeah-that's good."' On the strength of both growing attention and a demo produced by music industry friend Lance Quinn, the group landed not just your routine new band recording contract, bul promotfonal support strong enough to hold up a building. The songs on Bon Jovi, as quoted in the official bio, are of "lust, not love." Sometimes these bios are less than accurate, but in this case, admits Bon Jovi, "it sounds durnb, but I really said that. lf you read the lyrics, you'll see I really don't write love songs, because I'm not like that. I don't like to stick arou4d, or do the whole, 'eh, my sweetheart' trip and holding on," he says disgustedly. "With the one girl you fall in love with, it's a different thing, and you shelter her as much as you can. She wouldn't want to see what goes on on the road." The "one girl," in Bon Jovi's case, turned out not to be heavy-metal guitarist Lita Ford, once with The Runaways (from whence Joan Jett sprang). Though Ford and Bon Jovi

ngw-and possibly more in the past-she was not, he stresses, the muse that inspired his first single, "Runaway." "Lita is a friend, but no relation to the song title. I did 'Rundway'before I met her. "'Roulette' is my favorite song on the album," he continues. "lt describes love, lust, whatever, as far as I can take it. Around and around,
are friends

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r:.:

and when you're done, you're done." Bon Jovi, the band, is about halfway through recording its second album, and the group's been making the rounds, with TV appearances on American Bandstand and Thicke of the Night, plus their ubiquitous touring as an opening act. Neither the group nor its namesake promises the advent of Italo-American rock, but every now and then the stubborn intensity ot the ltalian sensibility pokes its head up from Bon Jovi: the LP, the band and the man-individually and collectively. Mario Lanza would be proud, even if he's turning over in his grave. n
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