video: One of the last performances of Let it Rock. The song would disappear from the setlist after the New Jersey Syndicate Tour.

I create
“Life lessons in Bon Jovi songs” videos for YouTube.
This blogpost is the pre-work.

“Let It Rock” is the first song on Bon Jovi’s sales-through-the-roof, mega-successful album Slippery When Wet.

The song was played live both on the Slippery When Wet Tour (1986-1987) as well as its successor the New Jersey Syndicate Tour (1988-1990).
Bar a few collector-worthy vinyls that showed up on the Google search, it was never a single and the song wasn’t played anymore after these tours either, with the exception of an occasional appearance the 2010 Circle Tour.

Probably fueled by its rarity, the song has become a fan-favorite, and I would say it is the unexpected gem, the secret weapon, that solidified the album.
“Let it Rock”, although never revealed to the broader public, was the proverbial icing on the rock n’ roll cake, that made the album Slippery When Wet work, in particular because of its intro:
An originally unnamed instrumental composition on keyboard (it’s not even in the official sheet music book!) that became known in the internet era as “Pink Flamingos”.

But in the 80s it was simply the first minute of side A of the album.
The first unforgettable, 57 seconds, your first impression of the album.
And we ALL know, how important those are!

Let It Rock was also the song which on the Slippery Tour had the questionable honor of having its hallmark intro clipped, and being shamelessly pasted in front of the performance of the B-side opener of the album, Raise Your Hands!
And not just 57 seconds because Pink Flamingos was turned into keyboard  player and composer David Bryan’s time to shine on the stage, as he took the familiar opening tunes of the Slippery album to a whole new level for the live audience.

An audience which, I can only imagine, must have been slightly disappointed when it was then treated to Raise Your Hands, and not Let It Rock!
Usually (I am not that big of a connaisseur to have numbers or percentages) Let It Rock would get played, later in those shows. But without its characteristic intro.

So it is those first 57 seconds of the album, the part that would later be known as “Pink Flamingos” that actually make the song, and therefor the album, work.
I would go as far as to say that although the album sales were obviously driven by their hit singles, You Give Love a Bad Name, Livin’ On A Prayer and Wanted Dead or Alive;
It was in fact the David Bryan’s composition that made the album itself, stand out.
That made it more than a collection of hits and that push it right out of the gateway, from good to provocative. Unforgettable. Epic.

After 57 seconds, the song breaks into what is obviously the “real” intro; A series of  whoo hoo hooos, moving up, and then another moving down the ladder, effectively supported by a heavy, slow pulsing push, of guitar-driven rock!

And then?
“Aaahhh” (01:17)
In a moment of silence we hear an erotic, close to grunting, sigh!

Jon Bon Jovi’s first individual contribution to the Slippery When Wet album was, in my opinion, a faux orgasm.
A feature that, perhaps understandably, would never be repeated live.

Now as we have all been professionally warmed up, the actual, actual, Let It Rock begins.
And with every beat, it manages to hammer you deeper into your desires, your power, your darkness, your strength!
Its pace slightly slower than you would like, or would expect, keeping you on the edge, yearning for more.

My own experience with Let It Rock is a very personal one, as I credit this song for my early sexual awakening.
I mean I was, sexually awakened from as long as I can remember. Details which I will omit here, because they’re probably too much information.
Yet my early teens had been a time when I was recalibrating.

I had had my first idol, a Dutch teen idol only a very few years older than me, so it was nothing radical or out of the ordinary.
But although I was still collecting his articles and pictures, the intensity of idolization had lessened, and I was on the lookout for something else.
Or to be more exact;
Someone else.

So when You Give Love A Bad Name, and Livin’ on a Prayer dropped, in the final five months of 1986, I was open for business.
But I definitely took my time, before I made my choice.

The most likely time of me getting the cassette of Slippery When Wet would have been summer 1987, for my 15th birthday.
It was then, that I heard Let it Rock.

And although it would still take almost a year at that point, before I would get my first boyfriend, Bon Jovi, their music, and the idol Jon Bon Jovi, had already started keeping me company.
Their three singles, You Give Love a Bad Name, Livin’ On  A Prayer and the 1987 single Wanted Dead or Alive, had opened the door, they had me engaged for sure.
But it wasn’t until I had that album, the actual immersion in their music, that gave me the full, exciting, and satisfying thrill of being a Bon Jovi fan.

And although my first boyfriend and me were a difficult match, and our circumstances challenging, I was sexually curious and not afraid of this totally new physical experience of being with a tall and by all standards impressive, 17, 18 year old young man.

And when early 1988 I got my second boyfriend, I actually got a sex life that was so absolutely wonderful, I would still sign up both for a man like that, as well as for a sex life like that, although in all probability, the two went hand in hand 😉

And it wasn’t until years, decades later even, that I understood how all that had happened.
How, in a world where so many girls and in particular sexually adventurous girls have all these bad experiences, a sex life I would still die for, was bestowed upon me.

It was because in the solitude of my bedroom in the attic, I had exposed myself day after day, night after night, to the cassette of Slippery When Wet.
It had taught me pure, uncensored, and unapologetic, sex.

It had been an initiation.

.
~Suzanne
Rock Star Writer
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Other stories about my fan years as a teen
in the book A Boyfriend Like Jon Bongiovi

The accompanying Life lessons in Bon Jovi songs video on the topic of 
Let it Rock 
will be recorded and will be published on my YouTube around the 15th of April 2024.

The next article in this series will appear around 20 April 2024 about:
You Give Love A Bad Name
Subscribe to this blog to receive it in your Inbox

.

That was it! 

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SOURCES for this series:

I
https://bjtours.jimdofree.com/the-albums/1986-slippery-when-wet/

II
https://ultimateclassicrock.com/bon-jovi-songs-ranked/
“All 334 Bon Jovi Songs, Ranked Worst to Best”
by Anthony Kuzminski

my businesses since 2023:

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The Bon Jovi album These Days (1995) starts with a pounding heavy guitar driven intro that cuts open your ribs, exposes your heart, and then drops its message right where it frickin hurts;

Hey God,
I’m just a little man, I got a wife and family
I almost lost my house, I bought into the dream
We’re barely holding on when I’m in way too deep
We’re two paychecks away from living out on the streets

With two more verses and a bridge, “Hey God” delivers three more stories.

These Days is a socially conscious, powerfully honest record that makes its point right from the first song.

Not only should “Hey God” have been These Days’ flag ship single;
It is also the entire These Days album, crushed into one song!

Meanwhile on Wikipedia:

“Hey God” is a song from American rock band Bon Jovi’s sixth studio album, These Days (1995),
released as the album’s fifth and final single on June 24, 1996.

Although it did not chart in the United States, it became a moderate hit in Canada, Finland, Iceland,
the Netherlands and the United Kingdom.

.
And after this first paragraph, on a page that will rank high in the category Ultra Short Wiki Pages About Amazing Rock Songs, the author could be explaining WHY this page is so short;

“As with most of the songs on These Days,
“Hey God” is one of Bon Jovi’s darker songs.”

“Bon Jovi’s darker songs”
Is it me or can you also almost hear the sigh in that?
Like a “Who needs that?”.

Or maybe the author was a bit bogged down by the lukewarm reception of the album, and he or she had forgotten they had actually liked that album,
and – mind you!- that in Europe we have entire clans of people, and when I say people I mean Real Serious Music Lovers,  who would never have gotten on the Bon Jovi wagon if it were not for the 1995 album These Days;
Maybe they had forgotten what the album had accomplished.

And in all fairness, these people who suddenly recognized the quality of Bon Jovi after listening to These Days, did drop off the wagon pretty quickly.
And yet!
As far as I know them, all have expressed Bon Jovi has earned that place in their heart and extensive vinyl collection, just from that album.

The “darker songs” on These Days did what no other Bon Jovi album had ever done; 
It won the critics’ hearts.

Now that I think of it, this might explain why I myself have been unfairly harsh to this album.
In a 2019 song-by-song Bon Jovi video series for my YouTube, which I am still committed to restore, I even boldly claimed that, in all honesty? 
These Days may be my least favorite Bon Jovi album.

*mike drop*

Which was not just a very unpopular opinion but being a fan of heavy music, being a Bon Jovi fan, and I am also a proud citizen of The Netherlands one of the few countries where the album was well received and probably doubled Bon Jovi’s fan base;
Then WHY was I so harsh towards this strong album?

I never investigated that question too much, also because I was kind of attached to my own antagonistic standpoint here.
But I think now that I m typing this blogpost I inadvertently answered my own question;
It was BECAUSE the serious critics suddenly got on the Bon Jovi wagon.

And mid 90s?
I mean give me a break!

SURE!
Maybe, mid 80s, out of spite for Bon Jovi clearing out your country  of female attention, you refuse to admit the Slippery songs are among the best songs in rock n roll history.
I get it, it was the 80s, and it all went really fast when within 6 months you received a three puncher of three hits that was so tough to take in, you just couldn’t.
I get it.

But the album New Jersey, 18 months after you got your Slippery-hits-ass whooping completed (on a strong strike, I admit) with Wanted Dead Or Alive?
Jon’s award winning record in 1990?
Richie’s blues album in 1991?
Keep The Faith in 1992?

Are you honestly gonna tell me you needed to wait until These Days 1995 before you heard that Bon Jovi was amazing?
I m just not buying it.

I will admit that me still leaning towards claiming These Days is my least favorite Bon Jovi album, is not backed up by facts.

But in hindsight I can see why I just refused to agree with people who were NOT there, in the years when Bon Jovi was being talked down upon as being just another hair metal band.

I can see why I owed it to my teenage heart who had recognized good music when she heard it,
to ignore all the serious music critics when mid-90s they wanted a piece of very tasty pies.
As if the Bon Jovi bakery had recently finally gotten the recipe right.

Girls years younger than the serious music critics had heard it from the get go,
but you were too busy looking down on it!
(and listening to Pink Floyd I imagine)

Okay that was a bit ranty.
But you get the idea.

In a way These Days is for the Bon Jovi catalog what The Last Jedi is for Star Wars fandom;
A work of art that managed to double the fan base, but with two halves that hardly talk to each other.

Unlike all the Bon Jovi albums that had come before it, and I would argue pretty much all the Bon Jovi albums that came after;
These Days did not come to us, in the spirit of union.

It cut us open with the first riffs and in song seven we’re still bleeding on the floor.

I can’t write a love song the way I feel today
And I can’t sing no song of hope, I got nothing to say

I can’t fight the feelings that are buried in my veins
I send this song to you, wherever you are
As my guitar lies bleeding in my arms

My Guitar Lies Bleeding In My Arms
(song 7)

These Days was a raw and honest “WTF God?!” message, that never pretended to be anything it wasn’t.
Least of all a regular Bon Jovi record.

And regardless of how long we’d been in fandom, regardless how old we were at the time that record was released, or regardless if we’d already been born;
We all felt that.

And to this day, 2021, painfully slowly clawing our way out of the pandemic;
We still do.

Hey God,
there’s nights you know I want to scream
These days you’re even harder to believe
I know how busy you must be, but Hey God…

~Suzanne
Rock Star Writer
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