- submitted by . on 08/10/2009
Unspoken Tragedy Of Arena Football League Collapse: Jon Bon Jovi Has More Time For Music
A lot's been spoken about the sports implications of the Arena Football League (AFL) collapsing. (Following last year's "temporary" suspension, the league recently announced it will end operations "indefinitely"--i.e., forever.) But what about the implications on us music fans? Yea, football players are going to lose their jobs and we're not all that happy about that.*
But the real untold story -- the tragedy no one's willing to touch -- is this: Jon Bon Jovi, the owner of AFL team Philadelphia Soul & active AFL promoter, now has a hell of a lot more time on his hands. Which means, let's face fear it, a lot more time to make and play and perform his mostly God-awful music.
More unnerving, since by all accounts Bon Jovi was an ardent football owner and fan, he's probably really bummed right now. Guess how many new barely listenable -- borderline execrable -- faux-rock ballads we're likely to hear in the future...the ode to My Philly Soul, duets with dopey TV-country singers, sappy videos with mannequin models.
We have nothing against Jon. From from what we know, as far as pop stars go, he's a pretty OK guy. But his music...it would be disrespectful to him as a stand up Jersey guy to be anything less than honest. And, honest, his music sucks and we really don't need more of it, at least more than we'd otherwise get if he'd been occupied in his growing role as Philly Soul CEO & AFL honcho.
We're not going to catalog Bon Jovi's music blights -- there have been many & they've been excoriated by way better music critics than we. (It might be blaspheme, but there probably are at least a few Bon Jovi songs that aren't blights, that might even be almost...listenable. But we're talking extreme minority here.)
For the "best" of the worst -- the real tell -- you only have to listen to any of Bon Jovi's "covers" of classic songs. Most covers by most bands suck. Bon Jovi's covers pulverize "sucks" to new lows.
A classic example -- Bon Jovi's unfortunate but genuinely laughable renditon of Try A Little Tenderness, leading into R.E.S.P.E.C.T. (both popularized by Aretha, many other greats). Here...
We stumbled onto a Top 10 of Bon Jovi Worst Covers at The Shark Guys, with vids. We don't know the site or who these sharks are. But most of the performances on the list are definitely bad-worthy and excruciatingly entertaining, if you're curious.
So, let's hope Arena Football finds its way back to solvency ASAP. It won't. When sports leagues fail and owners claim it's only temporary, it's never temporary. But there's always hope -- hope especially that with Jon's money and connections and his oft-stated passion for pro football maybe he can buy an NFL franchise. That's got to be way more work, possibly a full-time job even, and if that happens, well...it's almost too much to hope for.
*For the 98% of you who don't know, the AFL is a professional football league played indoors in the Spring in nok hockey-like arenas. The games are televised. Fewer people watch them than watch professional hockey -- which means very few -- and the players are players who aren't good enough to make it in "real" American pro football (the NFL) but not bad enough to concede stocking warehouse shelves at Lowes as the rest of their lives. In fairness, some people find the AFL entertaining -- there is tons of scoring -- and a handful of players have eventually made it to the NFL. ...read more rants
107 likes 
