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#49 Stick to your Guns
| life lessons in Bon Jovi songs

Welcome back, Jovi friends!
Life lessons in Bon Jovi songs continues with Stick to your Guns

Stick to your Guns is the ninth song on Bon Jovi’s fourth album;
New Jersey (1988).
Which was the one released after their biggie, Slippery When Wet. Bon Jovi were now the biggest rock stars on the planet, and the band had to deliver. And they did.

Unfamiliar with the song?
🎶🎧 listen to Stick to your Guns here
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context: DOUBLE NEW JERSEY

New Jersey would (and definitely “should”!) have been a double album, if it had been up to the band.
The record company blocked it, on grounds that they didn’t think fans would be able to pay for the higher price.
You can listen to all unreleased Bon Jovi outtakes here:
Rolling List of Hidden Bon Jovi Gems 1985 – current day
The extra songs from New Jersey start at “Love is War” all the way to Bon Jovi’s secret gem “Let’s Make It Baby”.
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video recorded Thursday 21 May 2026

Photobook behind me: Bon Jovi the Story by Bryan Reesman

In this video:

1. Welcome to another episode 00:00
Of Life lessons in Bon Jovi songs
I’m a bit rusty, haven’t done this in a while!
The previous episode was recorded a long time ago, but I do remember wondering about what cowboy actually do (for work), because Bon Jovi have so many cowboy-inspired songs.
So before filming I investigated what cowboys were, what they did for a living, and how they became mythologized.

2. Written by Holly Knight 03:56
Stick to Your Guns Is the third-in-a-row of the cowboy-inspired songs on side B of the album New Jersey.
It was written after a chance encounter between Holly Knight and Jon Bon Jovi.

They wrote it at Holly Knight’s place, but there was a fan following Jon around, who he wanted to avoid when he left.
So Jon wore a dark wig from Holly, and Holly wore Jon’s baseball cap, and they left in each other’s cars.

However, despite it being a juicy take on the story, they did not switch clothes!😅

You can find the whole story under the trivia, at this page:
https://bjtours.jimdofree.com/the-albums/1988-new-jersey/

3. Hardly ever performed live 08:02
Stick to your Guns was performed in Brussels 1988, so that is the same year the album was released. Jon Bon Jovi did his signature move of flying over the crowd to the back of the venue, yet didn’t remember the lyrics.
Bon Jovi – Stick To Your Guns | Uncut Performance | Brussels 1988

The next time was at one of many rehearsals in 1992, in preparation for an MTV special An Evening with Bon Jovi.
Bon Jovi – Stick To Your Guns / Living In Sin (acoustic / rehearsals / New York 1992)

And the final time it was played live was in Amsterdam in 2008, because fans had brought the lyrics with them, and held them up so Jon and Richie could read the lyrics.
Bon Jovi Amsterdam June 14 Stick To Your Guns

4. The Life Lesson 10:10
Closing the three cowboy-inspired songs on this album, I want to tie it to the myth of the cowboy.

And how sometimes myth, not truth, gives meaning to things we don’t have context or words for. Just like the myth of the cowboy helped Bon Jovi made sense of the insane life on the road, myths can help us navigate complex themes in our lives.

Next stop:
I’ll be there for You!

~Suzanne Beenackers

🇳🇱 Tikkie
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THIS SERIES
All videos, of Life lessons in Bon Jovi songs (playlist):
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLiGoDE3C06SeCKg4jvR2EoVHBOfXzHm_R

SOURCES for this series:

1. OUTTAKES
Handmade list with rare Bon Jovi songs
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLiGoDE3C06SfkAr0Ll4wz-GlGnZJNZDYh
Rolling List of Hidden Bon Jovi Gems 1985 – current day

2. RANKED
My favorite Bon Jovi article and indispensable for this series:
https://ultimateclassicrock.com/bon-jovi-songs-ranked/
By Tony Kuzminski.
List also covers any outtakes from the 2004 box set.

3. QUOTES
https://twostorytown.com/new-jersey-quotes
full page of quotes EVERYTHING anybody ever said about the 4th Bon Jovi album
https://twostorytown.com/singles

4. BJ TOURS
https://bjtours.jimdofree.com/the-albums/1988-new-jersey/

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