Forever Bon Jovi - Destination Anywhere

Retrouvez sur cette page toutes les informations sur "Destination Anywhere",
le second album solo de Jon Bon Jovi, sortit en 1997

Titres sur l'album, crédits d'écriture & lyrics :

Queen Of New Orleans (Jon Bon Jovi/Dave Stewart)
Janie, Don't You Take Your Love To Town (Jon Bon Jovi)
Midnight In Chelsea (Jon Bon Jovi/Dave Stewart)
Ugly (Jon Bon Jovi/Eric Bazilian)
Staring At Your Window With A Suitcase In My Hand (Jon Bon Jovi)
Every Word Was A Piece Of My Heart (Jon Bon Jovi)
It's Just Me (Jon Bon Jovi)
Destination Anywhere (Jon Bon Jovi)
Learning How To Fall (Jon Bon Jovi)
Naked (Jon Bon Jovi/Greg Wells/Mark Hudson)
Little City (Jon Bon Jovi)
August 7, 4:15 (Jon Bon Jovi)
Cold Hard Heart (Jon Bon Jovi) •

• Japanese And European Bonus Track

Jon a écrit "August 7, 4:15" en mémoire de Katherine Korzilius, fille du manager de Bon Jovi Paul Korzilius. Le titre lui est dédié. Le 7 Août 1996 à 4h15 Katherine a été retrouvée morte écrasée par un chauffard dans une rue d'Austin, Texas non loin de son domicile. Elle avait 6 ans. Jon a écrit ce titre en hommage à la petite fille et la famille Korzilius lui a demandé à de l'inclure dans son album solo. A ce jour, le meurtre de la petite fille n'a toujours pas été élucidé.

Critique de l'album :

The band headed on a brake after These Days, with both Jon and Richie aiming at making new solo albums. Jon came up with new material fast during 1996 while the band were still touring with These Days, and his first proper solo album was quickly finished. It was released in June 1997 under the title Destination Anywhere. While there were no big hit singles like Blaze Of Glory lifted from the album and the album didn't sell as vastly as band albums did, Destination Anywhere was another fine output from Jon.

Jon went into a bit of a new direction with Destination as he did some experimentation with synths and machines - something the band had never really done before (outcluding the first two albums) - and he did some notably different material compared to the band stuff. Also, for the first time really he was writing songs with other people than Richie and Desmond Child. The most interesting new person he worked with was Dave Stewart, with whom he wrote a couple of songs and who produced some of the tracks on the album. A total of five different persons produced songs on the album.

This was also the time when Jon embarked into films. While the band were on the brake, he appeared in small roles in several below average- quality movies. But, truth be told, his small movie-career has only suggested that he should stick to his day job: as an actor he's no better than Elvis, he's basically just another rich rock star trying to have a go at that other, equally as admired and desired art form.

Unlike with Blaze soundtrack, Jon took Destination Anywhere on tour with his "new" solo band The Big Dogs in 1997 and 1998, playing in smaller but more intimate venues than he had used to with the band.

The album begins with the crunching guitar riffs of "Queen Of New Orleans". Written by Jon and Dave Stewart, the song has very good lyrics (although they actually aren't about much) and catchy choruses. "New Orleans" is not really a regular rock song, but it is sort of on the edge of pop and rock, making a nice combination of the two. The crunching, excellent guitars of the song, the nicely fitting synths, very good lyrics and catchy choruses all contribute in making "Queen Of New Orleans" a great song. For me this is probably the best song of the album.

The first single, "Midnight In Chelsea", is also co-written with Dave Stewart. Lyrically this is the best song on the album. "Midnight In Chelsea" is quite unlike any traditional Bon Jovi song. It's not really rock at all and it has a very different sound to all the band stuff, but the new sound in this song is great, it's fresh, interesting and very appealing. The song wouldn't have worked at all as a band song, but to this Jon's solo album it fits very well. It's musically great and a delightul, fresh- sounding song. Midnight In Chelsea is an excellent song. It's if not just the very best song on the album, it's at least very close to it.

"Every Word" is one of the best songs of the album. It has very good lyrics by Jon and the thing that separates it from most of the tracks on this album is that it has a very rock sound. The song is gripping and guitar-heavy, especially at the chorus. Live on Jon's tour for Destination Anywhere the song was played at the beginning of concerts, and it was a good live song too. It's a great song.

"August 7, 4:15" is based on true events. Jon's friend's daughter was killed, and the song is written about the events, perhaps as a sort of relief or consolation for the grief of the parents. Instrumentally the song is very rocking; it is clearly the most rocking song on the album. And that is a problem. The arrangement is totally wrong, this shouldn't be a rock song at all. Considering the very serious nature of the song, it is just far from appropriate for this song to be rocking. While I'm not even sure if writing a song about this kind of sad and unfortunate incident is a good idea, the acoustic version of this song that was released as a B-side to "Midnight In Chelsea" single is much better and more appropriate version of the song than this.

Destination Anywhere is quite un-Bon Jovi. It sounds very different to the previous band albums (and "Blaze Of Glory") and only a few songs from it could have really fitted on a band album. This isn't an album of big guitar solos and big choruses. And what is also notable with this album is that it doesn't have even one big love song; the traditional BJ powerballad. That's kind of refreshing seeing that the previous band albums all had those, and it's good that Jon didn't force himself to write one that kind of song on his solo record.
But probably the biggest difference still is in Jon's experimenting with synths and machines. Basically, synths and such machines simply never sound good in music (though there have been some exceptions where they have worked), but Jon has managed to use them rather well. The synths don't sound so terrible on this and stick to your ear in a bad way. Although it's always best to avoid using them, they do add some flavour to some songs on this album and do fit for this album, so Jon has succeeded in using them.

Lyrically Jon, who wrote the album solely with the exceptions of four songs, has done a good job. The lyrics aren't even nearly as good as those of These Days, and to Keep The Faith he wrote some better lyrics too, but he still did a fine job and the lyrics on this album are mostly very good. And what's really significant is the fact that this marks the last time Jon wrote good lyrics. In that sense this is a significant album and time in the whole history of Bon Jovi.

Songwise Destination is fine, but not really great. Queen Of New Orleans, Midnight In Chelsea, Every Word Was A Piece Of My Heart, Staring At Your Window With A Suitcase In My Hand and Janie Don't Take Your Love To Town are all really good songs. But then there are a few rather weak songs on the album too and too much just mediocre stuff. And the standard quality of the album is weaker than that of any band or solo album for some time.

Comparing Destination to Blaze Of Glory is hard because the two are so different albums. While Blaze certainly had some better songs than Destination, it's obvious that this is more complete as an album, and that cowboy-soundtrack was never really a proper album anyway.

The album falls a bit flat on its latter part and there is too much just mediocre stuff on it for it to be a great album. But it's well-written, and Jon who explored new things on it and went with it towards a new, trendier sound has done good music, even though it may be a bit different to the traditional band stuff. So it's a good album and a good effort from Jon, but it's not a great album.

Les Musiciens :

- Autres producteurs: Dave Stewart (Eurythmics) pour "Queen Of New Orleans", "Midnight In Chelsea", "It's Just Me" et "August 7, 4:15", Desmond Chlid et Eric Bazilian pour "Ugly"

- Guitares: Bobby Bandiera de Southside Johnny & The Asbury Jukes pour "Janie, Don't You Take Your Love To Town", "Every Word Was A Piece Of My Heart" , "Destination Anywhere" et "Naked". Dave Stewart pour "Queen Of New Orleans", "Midnight In Chelsea", "It's Just Me". Lance Quinn pour "Staring At Your Window With A Suitcase In My Hand" et "Little City". Aldo Nova pour "Naked". Eric Bazilian pour "Ugly" et "It's Just Me". Jon Bon Jovi pour "Learning How To Fall" et "August 7, 4:15".

- Batterie: Kenny Aronoff

- Basse: Hugh Mc Donald

- Piano et accordéon: David Bryan pour "Staring At Your Window With A Suitcase In My Hand".

Quelques Notes :

- "Destination Anywhere" a donné lieu à un clip gigantesque inspiré par les chansons de l'album, avec entres autres Demi Moore, Kevin Bacon & Whoopi Goldberg.

- Deuxième album solo de Jon Bon Jovi après "Blaze Of Glory", la BO du film Young Guns II (1990). Date de sortie: 17/06/1997

- Jon Bon Jovi a composé cet album en 1996 en Europe alors qu'il tournait "The Leading Man", film dans lequel il tient le premier rôle.

- La plupart des chansons ont été écrites entre Londres, Amsterdam et Vienne de février à novembre 1996. A l'exception de "Queen Of New Orleans" et "Naked" composées à Los Angeles, "Little City" et "August 7, 4:15" composées dans le New Jersey et "Ugly" à Philadelphie.

- Elles ont été enregistrées entre New York, la Californie et le New Jersey.

- Pour cet album Jon Bon Jovi a fait appel a quelques collaborateurs renommés. Producteurs: Jon Bon Jovi a co-produit cet album avec Stephen Lironi Stephen Lironi est un talentueux producteur, compositeur et multi instrumentaliste Ecossais aujourd'hui basé à Londres. En 10 ans de carrière il a produit des hits pour Fun Lovin' Criminals, Hanson et Baby Bird entres autres.

- L'édition espagnole inclut le titre "Miro A Tu Ventana" qui est la version espagnole de "Staring At Your Window With A Suitcase In My Hand".

- L'édition Japonnaise inclut la démo "I Talk To Jesus" (titre également disponible sur plusieurs maxis tirés de l'album)

- L'édition limitée contient 2 Cds. L'album Destination Anywhere et un Cd de versions live de: "Queen Of New Orleans", "Midnight In Chelsea", "Destination Anywhere", "Ugly", "It's Just Me", "August 7, 4:15", "Jailbreak" (reprise de Thin Lizzy), "Not Fade Away" (reprise de Grateful Dead), "Janie Don't You Take Your Love To Town" (version live acoustique)

- Les démos issues de l'album: "Sad Song Night", "I Talk To Jesus", "Drive".