At first Jon Bon Jovi wasn't convinced about “Livin' on a prayer”

Bon Jovi's big 1987 hit, “Livin' on a prayer“, initially it seemed not destined to be so, since the band's frontman wasn't so convinced about the song. Luckily, bassist Hugh McDonald stepped in with an uncredited contribution.

In a recent one interview for People, released shortly after the release of the docu-series “Thank you, goodnight: the Bon Jovi story” (here is our interview and here is the review), Jon Bon Jovi recalled regarding his group's great classic: “It's not that I didn't want to record it, but the day we wrote it I wasn't very convinced. It was a simple progression of chords, melodies and lyrics.”

McDonald, however, got his hands on it and “Livin' on a prayer” suddenly took on a new momentum: “The bassline came to life in the studio demowhen we worked it out with the band”, explained the leader of the New Jersey formation: “That's how it became the song that it is“.

In addition to stating that Bon Jovi “knew what they wanted, but they just hadn't achieved itso much so that I thought, 'it's just another good day at work,'” the 62-year-old musician remarked, “And I was wrong: it's one of the most important songs in our catalogue“.

In the same chat with People, Jon Bon Jovi confirmed that he also had doubts about another song that later became one of the band's biggest hits: “Always” from 1994. Without denying that it is “one of our greatest songs ever”, the Bon Jovi frontman stated: “When I wrote it, we demoed it for a movie I wrote it for, and we thought, 'Yeah, that's not very good.'. We shelved the song until an A&R guy friend of ours was listening to some 'lost' songs and said, “Do you know this is a monster hit?! And he was right.”

In addition to celebrating their history with the four-episode documentary directed by Gotham Chopra, on June 7th Bon Jovi will release a new album“Forever”, preceded by the single “Legendary“.