Category: songs

5 Unexpectedly sexual Bon Jovi songs. And how they saved me from the Dark Side

Published on by Suzanne Beenackers1 Comment

I was on THE VERGE of writing a part deux to a Dutch post I wrote yesterday.
You see, unlike anything anybody expected to get out of this quarantine situation, our national health service thingy – the one which makes all the recommendations about what to do about the C. crisis – very unexpectedly gave us singles ONE sex buddy each!

It was almost like that joke, where the patient asks his doctor if he can play piano after his fingers were broken.
And the doctor says yes, and he answers:
“Cool! I could never do that before!”

Because we never had sex buddies.
And most singles do not have sex at all, right?
Even most people in relationships and/or married don’t have flourishing sex lives, but at least they have some options and chances- someone to focus their efforts on. And then out of the clear blue sky; Bam!
We get a free gift!
1-0 for Dutch singles!
After two-and-a-half month of quarantine we take the lead, by unexpectedly getting a One sex buddy each – voucher, during lockdown.

When technically, up until that moment, singles didn’t even exist below the belt.
And this goes in particular for the females! 
The only time we are allowed to have sex is when it happens because we feel “safe” and “special”.
READ: If we are somehow tricked into thinking he’ll have a relationship with us, then we might have sex somewhere surrounding a dating situation.
And maybe he’ll come back and make a decent woman out of us, by dating us for a longer period of time.
Or, alternatively, he doesn’t and then we automatically were “wrong” or “too soon”.

Health, exercise and mental health, are all talked about and treated and so on, far more extensively than 50 years ago. But the refusal to see that this goes hand in hand with A – privilege
Of money, time, and freedom.
And B. – sexuality
is still present.
We like talking about health when it means we can tell people off for eating unhealthy and giving them meal plans and exercise schedules.
We do not like talking about women who make their marriages toxic by being obsessed with clogged up arteries and wining about their husbands’ drinking, eating and sitting on their ass watching tv all day, numbing the noise out;
When HE would be wide awake enjoying life if he had kept chasing the ladies and taking care of his body after his wedding day;
And she would be a blushing, fun, woman hitting the gym and all the hot guys half her age, if she had given herself permission to just go for it and enjoy life.

We have very limited ideas about where we want our health and happiness to come from, and sexuality – with its massively disruptive effects and unpredictable behavior because – hey! it really does take two!- sexuality is our least favorite tool.

If a sex doctor could tell us we would add an extra twenty years to our lives if we would give up on the idea of regiment and limitations, and surrender to what our senses bring us?
Say yes to adventure, to uncertainty; Let ourselves be tempted?

We wouldn’t do it.

We would rather die underused and RIGHT; Accepted, boring but reliable;
Than to die having broken all the written and unwritten rules, and add twenty years of fun and adventure to our name.

So, considering how strict married people are to themselves, judging their own extramarital sexuality so harshly, it will come as no surprise that it is not supported in singles either.

Anyway, I feel I m drifting off but just interpret the previous paragraphs of proof of how much time I had already spent studying this, and coming to accept that it was all just so rotten and hopeless, I was not going to see the day we would normalize sex.
Because it makes it relatable as to HOW THRILLED I was with this government organisation, unexpectedly, giving us the green light to go have sex!
Like I said with the piano comparison;
So cool!
Because we never had that before.

24 Hours after that announcement, and after my blog which by the way I did not intend to write (I usually don’t write in Dutch, just about yoga or cartoons).
24 Hours after I wrote about this great news for The Netherlands, and since The Guardian wrote about our sex buddy as well, you could probably say great news for the world as a whole;
They pulled it back.
The government organization.
As a friend of mine would say:
“They pulled back their turd.”

God damn it.
I knew it!

I was so angry.
The blog had been for nothing. The joy had been for nothing. And we were back to the same patriarchal misogynistic residual Christian bullshit society we had been living in for 2000 years.
And although this Saturday was supposed to be spent buying a new vacuum cleaner and preparing for my new Bon Jovi video for tonight I SWORE I had to write a part deux for the Dutch blogpost!
And it was going to be FULL-ON!
I was going to destroy everything…

I was going to strike back by letting everyone know what I had already been vowing in silence at the beginning of this crisis, when I had gotten absolutely sick of the compliant, fearful, nature of the Dutch when lockdown measures were taken (suffice to say I understood why it took the Germans less than 48 hours to take this country);
That I was going to rebel for the rest of my life to make up for the miserable, fearful months, in which I was domesticated by law.
I was going to sleep with every married man, I set my eyes on.
As a principle.
Revenge.
The remaining part of my life would serve as a very big fuck you to a society that had behaved like chickenshits, and that had used a virus to force its restrictive unhealthy views on sexuality down everybody’s throat, by allowing only the married couples to have sex.

I could see myself go to sleep with the taste of blood in my mouth every night, of all the marriages I would cut the arteries of.
Just for fun.

I would kill for pleasure.

So, that was the dark, depressed, deplorable mental state I was in, when within 24 hours the government just snatched their gift of the sex buddy back. 
And I could not let this go.
I really thought there was no turning back. I was determined to go over to the Dark Side.

And then something happened.
It seemed insignificant at first. I noticed a new Bon Jovi fan, who was having lively interaction with some of the accounts I follow.
I checked his timeline first. I certainly didn’t need any more negativity since I was carrying enough toxins within me, to poison an entire fanbase.
I didn’t need anybody else’s.
But he checked out.

And I sent him a tweet, and soon the happy replies were mine to receive. I answered but in silence I still thought: “I will stay angry with the world!”
But he won.

And The Most Hateful Post where I declared war on married people, Dutch government, and all those not in favor of sex buddies for everybody, evaporated.
It is gone.
Entirely. 

What were my favorite Bon Jovi songs? he asked.
And my least favorite?
And did I know this song?
And that song?

And tweet by tweet my anger just fully and thoroughly melted away. And I knew that whomever he was, he was obviously here to keep me from spreading hate.
Heal me from being angry.
And ultimately, to have a conversation about which Bon Jovi songs were the sexiest.

And so we did.

So maybe that is the big lesson, the take away here:
You can’t plan these things. Not the good, nor the bad.
You can’t plan on having sex buddies anymore than you can plan on not having them. Love and sex cannot be planned nor approved by government or by anybody else – they just happen when they do.
And usually when you least expect it.

~Suzanne 

Top 5 Sexiest Bon Jovi Songs

And the lyrics that prove it.

5. Diamond Ring (These Days, 1995)

“When you’re hungry, I will fill you up
When you’re thirsty, drink out of my loving cup”

This song probably has the strangest history out of all Bon Jovi songs.
Written for New Jersey (1988) it didn’t make the cut. Neither did it for Keep for Faith (1992).
But it has been performed live from the late 80s onward.
By the time it was released on record, they had been performing Diamond Ring on stage for years.
Letting hundreds of thousands of fans drink out of their loving cup.

4. River of Love (Richie Sambora solo, 1991)

“Take you down real slow
And then your body will quiver
And the river will flow”

When Howard Stern inducted a reunited Bon Jovi to The Rock n Roll Hall of Fame, he made jokes which referred to the sexual appetite of Richie Sambora, and I don’t think any fan has any doubt which one of the two front men possessed the “raw, untamed power”, as Star Wars put it.
Yet, it actually took me until a couple of failed attempts of searching for super sexual songs or lyrics, for a variety of art projects, to realize how non-explicit Bon Jovi songs really were.
There are no sexual words in there.

But having said that, comparing the solo records from Jon and Richie, will give you an indication of which one of the two… well.
You do the math.

3. Amen (what About now,2013)

“Honeysuckle on her lips
Sweeter than a man deserves to taste
Mercy, mercy, what else can I say?”

Much to my surprise, this – in my opinion – extremely intimate song, has been played live all the way up to their most recent tour in 2019.
Hail to Jon.
Amen.

2. I’m Your Man (Burning Bridges,2015)

“When your heart is hungry
When you want a secret you can keep
You know that you can call me
Anytime for anything you need”

This is my personal favorite! 
Not just because this song describes my perfect relationship, but it’s so upbeat and fun! The odd-one-out Burning Bridges album (2015) is worth its weight in gold for many reasons, but just having that album to have I m your Man blowing from your speakers and waking up the neighborhood, would probably already suffice.
As sort of a super important PS on this song!!
This is NOT the Leonard Cohen cover song I’m Your Man, which Bon Jovi has performed several times, and which is also very sexual, but in a more…. scripted way.
It’s used as a little play, between Jon Bon Jovi and his female audience.
You can find a video of that I m Your Man cover version, with crowd interaction, at the bottom of this post.
So if you Google I m Your Man Bon Jovi – live, you will find that cover version.
But the happy, upbeat I’m Your Man as it was released on the Burning Bridges album, has never been performed live.
Making it one of the most underappreciated Bon Jovi tracks ever.

1. Let’s Make It Baby (both versions)

version 1 Let’s Make It Baby- New Jersey Deluxe 1988 (demo)

version 2: released in 1996 on a 2-disc These Days album 

“I want to play doctor.
It keeps getting harder, harder, harder to keep me away
I want to taste the sweat that’s runnin’ off of your body.
Get the sheets all wet, I wanna make you feel naughty”

If “Amen” was a tribute to Leonard’s Cohen, Hallelujah; Let’s Make it Baby, is a haunting trip all the way back to the psychedelic organ-led music of The Doors.
Including Jon Bon Jovi diving so deep into the purest and strongest of desires.
Bon Jovi’s most erotic song, will probably stay unknown forever.
Hidden, on the Dark Side.

~Suzanne

Update 

In June 2020, I renamed this site from Rock Star Yoga to Rock Star Writer.
I ll update all blogposts (there are 46) and will get my fingers into the YouTube channel soon, including retrieving content I had to take down in January because of technicalities.

New videos expected too, at Suzanne Beenackers YouTube

About this blog

These blog posts will go out randomly, as topics reveal themselves.
You can find the subscription button on this page, probably somewhere on the right.

Rock Star Writer on Facebook*
my personal Twitter account

* sadly enough all referrals/ links to the Rock Star “Yoga” page on Facebook (url), have become invalid. I intend to start curating this blog, and update the links.

The Fire Inside

Published on by Suzanne BeenackersLeave a comment
With the unpredictable cycle of starting business plans and cancelling them;
Rebooting video and letting it fall flat on its face;
Dangling between video and writing
and the impossible choice between two languages.
But also:
The unexpectedly soothing and satisfying experience of becoming a yoga teacher again:
 
I finally understood what the underlying common demeanor was.
What they key element was, of what it is I DO.
 
And it’s not either or.
Not even either the work I do under this name, versus the pen name;
An alias account (on Fb since 2010) where I basically stopped writing after C crisis.
With my entire sexuality falling flat on its face, and probably staying there for months if not years to come,
there were no aspects of my life that were even remotely secretive or exciting enough to be written about under a pen name.
 
But it was not an either or, of any of those things.
 
As tempting as it is, to simplify life to ONE thing you’re doing, ONE thing you’re selling;
For some of us, that’s not the way we roll.
We don’t know what we’ll be doing the moment our feet hit the floor in the morning, let alone what business we’ll build for years to come.
 
But I did find the one thing I, and perhaps any other soul who has been wondering how to survive this crisis sanely,
can do to not just get out of this intact.
But to be so engaged in something else that you stop caring about whether or not you do get out.
 
Something that is so profoundly spiritual, yet so engaging, addictive, COMPELLING! that if they tap you on the shoulder after C. you’ll furiously snap:
“I m busy!!”
 
And that thing that will save you (if you have it in you, if you are this) that thing is CREATION
 
It is only in creation and our creativity, that life makes sense. Not because we understand every little detail, but because we’re creating new things.
Like God created the earth;
We too become the creators of our own lives.
 
The statue on the picture is Shiva:
Creator of Worlds.
But he is also the destroyer of worlds.
Whether Shiva creates more than he destroys?
No one knows.
Maybe the other Gods pitch in, to make up for the damage.
 
I wrote about Shiva because I have this statue at my studio.
And it wasn’t until later that I heard the story of a studio burning to the ground for no apparent reason,
and its owners “blaming” it to Shiva;
Although I m sure they were smart enough to understand that something else was created.
And that the brick and mortar yoga studio was no longer nessecary to contain it.
Maybe the thriving but fixed business, was standing in the way of the new work the teachers would now start doing.
 
The moment you stand still and resist change you are like ice:
You can only hope that you won’t melt.
 
But the moment you become creative, you start your dance with Shiva, in the ring of fire.
You breathe life into life.
You bring unexpected death and destruction.
And people will never know what to expect because you will be ever changing.
 
As soon as you start creating, you will become Life itself.
.

~Suzanne

The Fire Inside is a Bon Jovi song from the 4-5 disc box set
100 million Bon Jovi Fans Can’t be Wrong
You can find the song at the bottom of this post.

Update 

In June 2020, I renamed this site from Rock Star Yoga to Rock Star Writer.
I ll update all blogposts (there are 46) and will get my fingers into the YouTube channel soon, including retrieving content I had to take down in January because of technicalities.

New videos expected too, at Suzanne Beenackers YouTube

About this blog

These blog posts will go out randomly, as topics reveal themselves.
You can find the subscription button on this page, probably somewhere on the right.

Rock Star Writer on Facebook*
my personal Twitter account

* sadly enough all referrals/ links to the Rock Star “Yoga” page on Facebook (url), have become invalid. I intend to start curating this blog, and update the links.


.

Wanted Dead or … Alive?

Published on by Suzanne BeenackersLeave a comment
This is not an easy blog post, and I give you full permission to not read it.
I created an upbeat 8 minute video, today.
So I certainly do not intend to make Rock Star Yoga all doom and gloom!
And knowing myself, I may actually “snap out of this”! 
I may suddenly see the light, and move forward in a way like never before.
So you’re very welcome to wait until that day, because I appreciate your presence and I am very selective with what I read myself:
If you are here for the days that IT ROCKS!
I send you all the love, and permission to skip, fully granted ❤
.
But for me, nor the massive breakthroughs nor the sudden cancellations, happen overnight. 
A lot of thinking and processing happens before that, and today is such a day.
.
In the 8 months Rock Star Yoga exists, I have not doubt it so strongly as today.
And I want to share with you what haunts me.
Why I feel unsure if there is still a place for Rock Star Yoga, in this world.
If there is still a place for me, the truest part of me, as an individual.
I’m sure the toned-down, responsible version of me can make a contribution.
But that’s not the real me.
.
Tonight I wrote a post for the Facebook page.
And what was intended to be a short goodnight post, turned into a detailed description of why I suddenly doubt my mission, my purpose, in light of the C crisis.
Why I really have no idea what my purpose is and if Rock Star Yoga did not belong in a world that is now lost.
In one of the many earlier videos of Rock Star Yoga, which I had to delete because YouTube had unedited my 400+ videodatabase, I talked about the difference between creators or creatives versus builders or sustainers.
And that although the world is fascinated with creators/creatives, little is understood of our nature.
That you can’t educate us, or train us, or ask of us to behave in a different, more constructive way, without damaging the essence of who we are.
Just like a builder/sustainer will never come with something truly creative;
A creator/creative will never come with something truly sustainable.
We, creatives, create and we destroy.
That is the nature of who we are.
You could say: That is our purpose.
In retrospect, the post I wrote for Facebook, and I will include it exactly the way I wrote it there, is about that difference.
I guess what has been haunting me is:
In a world that became for builders and sustainers, overnight,
do we still create?
.
Or do we still exist?
.
~ Suzanne
.

As posted on Facebook

.
Sometimes I feel every update in the last month cries for this particular Gif:
Jon Bon Jovi in the eighties.
I believe it’s from the Wanted Dead Or Alive video.
I could, should maybe one day will, write a blog post on the complexity of ALL of the emotions going on in this three second clip!
But not tonight.
.
Because tonight I really do feel like Jon there.
.
As if it never ends.
.
Like all of us I suppose, I feel confronted with difficult choices every day.
Can I go out? Should I ALWAYS stay indoors?
Can I NEVER see a friend or family member without having to be deeply ashamed of my wildly irresponsible behavior?
.
And for how long?
Until there is a vaccine every interaction is going to be scrutinized?
.
Despite Dutch government explicitly saying the virus will become a common factor in our daily lives, and that the only reason we are putting a stop on social interactions is because otherwise the hospitals will collapse,
I keep reading comments that imply all citizens should behave as if they are in total lock-down.
Even though government deliberately did not go for a lock-down because it does not believe the virus can ultimately be stopped.
.
But on social people who go outside are shamed.
Even though our Dutch regulations say you can go outside, and even meet a friend as long as you are healthy and don’t touch each other.
.
So it seems at least to me, that somewhere something doesn’t add up.
Social distance for strangers seems to have been confused with friends and family; And working from home and avoiding crowds was confused with measures instructing a total lockdown.
.
Some of you may remember a video I shot two weeks ago, and I m not going to include the link because that’s making it more important than it is, but I have a social phobia.
And it’s taking its toll.
.
I, and I can only imagine other people with social phobias as well, do not hear the reasons on which you judge other people.
We hear that you judge.
And we interpret it as:
“If I want this person to be my friend, I need to behave just like he or she insists is the only right way, or I have to be prepared to discuss it.”
.
I understand it’s fear.
I understand you’re worried.
I understand you’re probably projecting accusations on things and behaviors you’ve seen that do not have anything to do with me, onto me.
But all that doesn’t make it easier.
.
And I wonder how long we are going to look at each other to “be careful” in order to protect ourselves and our loved ones?
.
This could take 18 months, before we have a vaccine.
.
Are we going to forbid healthy people to go out, for 18 months?
Are we going to prohibit children from playing outside, for 18 months?
Are we going to keep banners on our Facebook profiles “Stay inside” for 18 months?
.
And I have a social phobia: Nothing scares me more than the idea that I behave in a way that you will judge me for.
I will stay inside for 18 months, don’t worry.
.
So it would surprise me if you would see me change things.
If I would have that conversation on how much time we are prepared to stay in hiding.
I ll hide forever.
.
Not because I m afraid of the virus but of your judgement.
.
Some of us destroy others, others destroy themselves.
.
Two days ago, I destroyed my pen name.
I didn’t want to be the artist I was for 14 years, because she could not breathe in this world.
So I rescued her, and brought her to 1995.
Where she can take solace, for as long as it is needed.
.
But Rock Star Yoga?
Man… I don’t know.
.
I feel that either I have to pretend Rock Star Yoga is a bonding, unifying practice; vanilla and sweet.
And safe.
In other worlds, I would have to pretend it’s normal yoga.
.
Or admit that Rock Star Yoga is rebellious way of doing life, because it ultimately stands for individual freedom.
In a time when everybody is so relieved that we have finally found our collective, that is an unbearable message…
.
And that therefor, just like my pen name, I may have to stop Rock Star Yoga.
Because we have enough that disrupts society already.
..
Rock Star Yoga was to create awareness that you are a lot more free than you think.
That morals are worth fighting.
I was 15 when I said groups and collective thinking were evil.
I never fitted into groups, I was afraid of them and I found them dangerous. By calling it a social phobia I m taking all the blame ( “Oh it’s me!”) but that’s me being agreeable.
I think it’s very threatening that we are not thinking about our own boundaries and so easily adapt the Your Body Is A Weapon Of Mass Destruction That Should Be Hidden Indoors vision.
.
So dead or alive?
.
I really, honestly, don’t know.
.
~Suzanne
.

Update 

In June 2020, I renamed this site from Rock Star Yoga to Rock Star Writer.
I ll update all blogposts (there are 46) and will get my fingers into the YouTube channel soon, including retrieving content I had to take down in January because of technicalities.

New videos expected too, at Suzanne Beenackers YouTube

About this blog

These blog posts will go out randomly, as topics reveal themselves.
You can find the subscription button on this page, probably somewhere on the right.

Rock Star Writer on Facebook*
my personal Twitter account

* sadly enough all referrals/ links to the Rock Star “Yoga” page on Facebook (url), have become invalid. I intend to start curating this blog, and update the links.

Always

Published on by Suzanne BeenackersLeave a comment

When he holds you close, when he pulls you near
When he says the words
You’ve been needing to hear, I’ll wish I was him
‘Cause these words are mine, to say to you
‘Til the end of time

If there is one thing I will remember from this year, it will be attending the Bon Jovi concert.
It caused such a massive shift within me, I knew my life would never be the same again.
It was two hours and twenty minutes of anthem after anthem, in my experience.
And a song in the encore, every fan hopes to hear: “Always”.

It is rarely played because of the vocal range it requires. Jon Bon Jovi must have been feeling really good, because there certainly weren’t any external incentives.
Nijmegen wasn’t a big show.
There were no professional recordings released from that day, by Bon Jovi. No plans to use footage shot on a rainy night on a location no one has ever heard of.
It really was an encore, an extra.
And it was the icing on the cake of a spectacular night.

Unfortunately, despite the spiritual experience of that night, the concert didn’t turn out to be the overnight fix I had been hoping for.
I didn’t know that the final leg of my… depression? Midlife crisis? Burnout?
Was still ahead of me.
But on the bright side: It all did end before last Tuesday happened.
I had already celebrated my full recovery, before my lover broke up with me. During the final countdown of my crisis, I had deliberately kept myself from contacting him. It was oh so very tempting, to use my crisis as a way to intensify what we had.
To form a more intimate bond, by letting him help me.
But I couldn’t do it.

First of all because it would have been extremely painful for me if he had refused. And secondly, if he had comforted me, I would have been unsure if he had done so because I had pushed myself onto him or if he had wanted to be there for me.
Due to the freedom and the lightness we had always had in each other’s company, asking for help felt like pushing for “Always”:
It wasn’t mine to ask.
So I didn’t initiate contact.

Something I have a bittersweet feeling about now, in light of recent events. He has ended our affair and one of the reasons was because only spending the good times together, made “it” feel a bit empty.
Like I said, so bittersweet.
You must forgive me for not telling the whole story, but this part was worth mentioning I think.
Anyway, the real test came after the breakup.
Had I really changed?

Not so much compared to before the concert, but I was thinking more of:
Had I changed in comparison to the last time someone I was really into, broke up with me?
Over ten years ago.
To my ultimate delight, I can say:
Yes.
I am an entirely different person.

And that is such a powerful and joyful feeling, that there are moments this feeling – of dare I say enlightenment? – outweighs the sadness.
Maybe it’s comparable to if you’d turn into a vampire, and you know that you re immortal now. But would you ever be sure, until you were put through something that normally would have killed you?
That’s how I felt when for the first time in ten years someone I deeply cared for, and am still very much in love with, ended the relationship.

Obviously a separation process has many stages, and especially in the beginning a form of denial may be part of why I m feeling so good.
And yet:
I can’t help but KNOWING this is different.
That just like the vampire, I have become a different breed, that doesn’t abide by the same rules as she did ten years ago.
And I ve distinguished two reasons why that is.

Reason 1 : I still know how to feel good

Ten years ago, I was unaware that you must never build your road to your Higher Self or your happy self, through another person. Sure: I felt over the moon when I was with him.
And in the anticipation of seeing him, the hours before our date.
But I was SO aware it were my emotions, my feelings. I didn’t have them with any other man, yet that didn’t mean they were tied to him.
They were mine.

In all the years we were together, I had a clear vision that the positive feelings I was experiencing were created by me. And that I would therefor be able to access them any time I needed them.
Including the time after he broke up with me.

All those years, I appointed myself as The Person In Charge, when it came to feeling good. He never took advantage of that, and certainly pulled his weight when it came to making our dates memorable.
But it was learning to master my own feelings, that has been the major difference between moving on now, versus crashing down ten years ago.

Reason 2 : Love doesn’t die

Just like under “1” this is of course something he does contribute to. I have dated men who turned so cruel and cold in their communication, that there was no way I could keep my love for them burning.
In hindsight, I would definitely say the guy who broke my heart ten years ago qualifies as that. But it didn’t break until I had found out what he had done behind my back and had not told me.

I’m just saying all this to illustrate that these two ways in which I ve changed are relative. They re much easier to “accomplish” if you re dealing with a mature partner breaking up with you.

Anyway, like I said: Love doesn’t die.
A real connection, is something entirely magical.
You can learn to love someone, or create ideal circumstances for it to develop. But if you are romantic like me, nothing will beat the aliveness of a connection between two people who meet by chance, or who develop a bond over time, because they work together for example.

Whether two people get a real relationship, or if they end it;
It’s all just outer forms.
Things which are dependent on circumstances, and on desires as to what it is you want out of life.

A real connection, in my opinion, is something that transcends that.

Real love is like Always:
You don’t give it because someone paid you to do it.
Or because someone is entitled to have it.
And you don’t earn it by being at your best behavior, nor can you ever get it as a reward.

Real love can only be given freely.
And all you can hope for, is to have someone who will receive it.

~Suzanne
Rock Star Writer

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Bon Jovi concert reviews 1995-1996 Suzanne Beenackers YouTube

(These arms are) Open all night

Published on by Suzanne BeenackersLeave a comment
I can confirm these arms are always open for cuddling, licking, fetching, scratching, biting, playing catch, hide and seek. Because I am her love child. ~Flipje

“This title, Open all night, we’ve used about five times.
We finally did a song on the Bounce record, called Open all night. Great title, we never could get it right.”
Jon Bon Jovi, 32 min 28 sec 

So apparently there were five songs called Open All Night.
But even if you go with the three that were released, you’d have trouble distinguishing them.

The only mainstream version of Open all night is, like Jon said, on the album Bounce.

The Box Set, 100,000,000 Bon Jovi fans can’t be wrong, is for the fans and has two other versions: Open all night and These arms are open all night.

Three different songs, but they’re all ballads which makes them similar.
And although the title of the song on Bounce is “Open all night”;
Those lyrics say These arms are open all night.
Adding to the confusion about which song is which.

All-in-all Bon Jovi is open all night, usually with the arms included.
And it’s something that inspires them.

And lap sitting you have to tell them lap sitting too lap sitting is great it’s not just about the arms it’s also about the lap sitting because I am her love child ~Zaza

I’ve listened to all three songs, and here is what I found.

For clarity’s sake, I m going to assume the protagonist of these songs is male, and preferably Jon Bon Jovi, unless he specifically says that he is Jones and he drives a dented red Chevrolet then we go with that.
And we’ll assume the other person is a woman.

So here’s the three different songs:

1. Open all night
at 100,000,000 Bon Jovi fans can’t be wrong
live version Atlantic City 2004

Is about a girlfriend who has left to make it in the world and her boyfriend waiting at the bar, telling her not to worry.
Open all night refers to the boyfriend being open all night, meaning waiting for her.

2. These arms are open all night
at 100,000,000 Bon Jovi fans can’t be wrong
live version Borgota 2004

Is about a man who introduces himself as “Jones” and informs us he has a dented red Chevrolet, and gives a woman he met at the bar a detailed description how to get to his house.
Now if Jon Bon Jovi would try pick me up with this:
“These arms are open all night
If you need someone to talk to
A hand to hold onto and if it feels right
These arms are open all night”
That would be a Hell YES! if ever there was any.
I would feel completely seen, wanted, desired, and although I m not a night person at all, I would make an exception.
However.
This song explicitly identifies him as not being JBJ, but as “Jones”.
And I m actually surprised Jones sees the headlights of the woman behind him following him, because he confesses (out loud?):
“God only knows how long it’s been that I been this lonely”
Would not make me feel wanted at all….

For each their own I guess, but I m more than just a warm body and the shorter the encounter is gonna be, the more I want to feel that this man will do anything to be with me, because he desires me just so much it’s driving him mad.
Which brings me to:

3. Open all night, main version, Bounce
album recording

There is a reason this is the one that made it to the main studio album.
It starts with a verse where Jon – Jon’s back! I like him MUCH better than somebody who introduces himself with a surname Jones – shares with us that he saw us coming from a mile away and noticed our poor little heart was bruised black and blue.

Then we get a verse where he tells us that he too, has been hurt. He knows how it feels. And that the last thing we need is another pickup line, so he’s not going to do that.
Wait.
Maybe I should just quote this. Here are those verses:

“I saw you coming from a mile away
Trying to hide behind that pretty face
Bet my last dollar baby you been bruised
Poor little heart all black ‘n’ blue

Last thing you need’s another pickup line
You must have heard them all a thousand times
God only knows what you been through
Believe me I been broken too

It aches, it breaks, it takes your breath away
I’ve been around that block a time or two”
…
Okay, if there is a woman now, considering to NOT immediately go with Jon, she’s lying.
We just got picked up in 2,5 verse.
Bring in the chorus:
“Baby, I don’t want to fall in love with you
I try, try, try but I can’t get around the truth
Please don’t say my name, give this heart a break
I don’t want to make the same mistake but it’s too late
I’ll leave on the light
These arms are open all night”
Song number 3 wins. Jon gets the girl.
This is such a no-brainer that I feel like an idiot even going through the rest of the song, but I will do so, as a sign of song-appreciation.

So we had Jon buttering us up with perfect verses and bringing it home with the best pickup chorus in the history of rock music and then we have:
(Take it away Jon)
“I got your taste in the back of my mouth
I want to reach in and pull it out
And I’d be lying if I didn’t say
When you’re this close I’m afraid
Of the way I’ll feel if I touch your hair
The way I’ll miss you when you’re not there
And that I’ll see you when I close my eyes
It’s too late, I’ve crossed that line“
Not only did Jon have us at “Baby, I don’t want to fall in love with you”
He now burns the very last of our entire defense system to the ground,
by admitting he too has fallen hard for us.
That he didn’t want to fall in love, he wasn’t looking for it, he wasn’t needy or lonely, and yet it happened anyway.
*soft sigh*
Isn’t life beautiful?

Are we now not all dreaming of being swept off our feet by someone we don’t want to fall in love with, but we just can’t help ourselves?

In another documentary, Jon speaks about his mixed feelings of singing ballads in front of a live audience. The interviewer tells him that the crowd was completely quiet the other night, when Jon sang his version of Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah.
Jon answers:
“There is a ballad called Open all Night, on Bounce, that I love for that reason.
But it gets the polite applause at the end, because it’s not that..”
*makes energetic hand gestures*
(18 min 30 sec)

After this analysis of the lyrics of Open all Night on Bounce, I don’t believe Jon. I don’t believe anyone would not get it, if Jon sang this live.
That was not a “polite” applause.
That was “God that hurt please play a rock anthem to make it go away.” – applause.

It was a crowd with arms that were not just open for Jon;
They would have given them both to have him in it.

~Suzanne
Rock Star Writer


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These arms are open all night (Live)
version on 100,000,000 Bon Jovi fans can’t be wrong:

Work for the working man

Published on by Suzanne BeenackersLeave a comment


video: memorable performance and video of “Work for the Working Man” at the o2 in London 2010, night 10 (not night 11, as uploaded by hAnD90)

If it hadn’t been for this blog*
I would not have done my yoga.
[*note: in 2019 the blog was called Rock Star Yoga]

Yesterday and the day before that were both slow, extremely hot days, and I practiced at nighttime with my balcony door open.
And tonight I was out for the night, so when I came home I wasn’t exactly brimming with excitement at the idea of going to my mat.
However.
This is Rock Star Yoga.
And the rules of Rock Star Yoga are: Do something that works for you. Inspire yourself. Put on some music. 
Make it FUN.
So I did.

For inspiration I turned to hAnD90; a Bon Jovi channel on YouTube that uploads remastered material.
They had just uploaded a concert and it looked promising:
A Bon Jovi show from 2010, shot at the O2 Arena in London.

I put it on while I was trying to come down from my night out, and doing the dishes.
The sound quality was good, and the video quality too, although both suffered from being shot from the stands/ far away.

The video was a wide shot of the entire stage, and you could hear voices of people standing close to the recording device.
But I liked it.

After the dishes I dedicated the second half of the concert, to my yoga practice.
And for the first time I decided to do yoga with headphones.
It was already past 11 PM, the balcony doors were open, and I didn’t want to make too much noise.
I tucked my phone into my pants, playing the video, and as long as I didn’t do inversions or laid on my back, my yoga practice would be okay.

The past two days I only did very gentle yoga, but I had enough of keeping it so calm, and did standing poses and sun salutation inspired poses.
But then, transferring into lying poses, I made a mistake.
I intended to take the phone out of my pants, and place it on the floor next to me, and do my inversion practice with shoulderstand, bridge and plow pose variations.
But I looked at the screen and-
OMG!
It was sleeveless Jon!

Sleeveless Jon only comes out when things are getting heated, and this year he has barely come out at all.
This House is Not for Sale tour 2019 was already in week 6 or 7 when he finally made his debut appearance.
And I turned out to have a VERY STRONG reaction to sleeveless Jon!
It was probably a good thing we didn’t get to see him at Goffertpark, Nijmegen, because I m unsure if I would have been able to concentrate.
Maybe I would have relapsed into my 80s fainting thing, and be dragged to First Aid for some water.
But here he was.

And not only was Jon sleeveless, in the new upload from hAnD90 he was wearing his Let it Rock t-shirt!
A t-shirt I knew from two live recordings from my favorite Bon Jovi songs;
Let it rock (live) and Dry Country (live)

So while doing yoga I accidentally watched the screen and saw I now had a whole show with Jon wearing his sleeveless lavender colored top.

The beauty of this light color is that you can see him working up a sweat.
In hindsight I find it remarkable that I can drool over Jon Bon Jovi working up a sweat, and at the same time being a lazy-ass lizard myself, when temperatures in my living are above what I find ideal to actually do something on my yoga mat.

I was only halfway into my practice and I was now confronted with Jon Bon Jovi in the lavender T, something I had watched dozens of times because Dry County and Let it Rock had been my favorite live videos.

Yet I just couldn’t put my phone down again.
I was magnetized.

Bon Jovi played the O2 in London twelve times in 19 days.
Let it Rock and Dry County were not played in the show which was uploaded by hAnD90. But I just checked and “my” Let it Rock video and Dry County live were indeed filmed at O2 too.
Just on other nights.

So during the second half I watched the screen while doing yoga. Whether it was a lying twist, a wide-angle seated pose or a forward bend;
I managed to put the phone somewhere I could watch the pretty boring wide shot of the stage, with a 2 centimetre high Jon in a lavender shirt.
Yet I was glued to the screen.

I could not see the sweat here, because it was such a wide shot. But I could see his grinding hips, the powerful dance moves, the wide spread arms.
At one point he practically makes love to his microphone stand, or he’s making an elegant way down to study the set lists taped to the floor.
Or both.

For my long relaxation, I did stop looking at the screen.
The entire three song encore ( When we were beautiful, Wanted dead or alive, Livin’ on a Prayer) I just lay on my back with my eyes closed and listened.
Jon appeared, even with closed eyes.
He was wearing the lavender shirt and he was sitting next to me.
It was the Keep the Faith Jon, from the early nineties.
I liked his hair (pretty similar to 2010, slightly longer) and especially his golden earrings. They were so bold.
Jon stayed next to my mat, and we talked.

I don’t know which lesson was more important:
To not look at my phone halfway into my practice.
Or to realize that what distracts you only does so, because it’s already inside.

~Suzanne
Rock Star Writer

video: Bon Jovi | Live at O2 Arena | Night 11 | London 2010
Work for the Working Man is number 19
(the set list in description box video)

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99 In the Shade

Published on by Suzanne BeenackersLeave a comment

update, September 20, 2020

You’re about to read the second post I wrote for this blog,
which was then still called Rock Star Yoga.
Not Rock Star Writer.

And this blog post is interesting, because you can really see the coat of this being a yoga blog, didn’t fit, right from the start.

That ultimately I m not a yoga teacher, nor a writer.

I am a Bon Jovi fan.

~Suzanne 

99 In the Shade

original post, July 25, 2019

JBJ in bath in the 80s: this was my original pic

I was Googling a photo to go with this post, which I intended to call “99 in the Shade” after the Bon Jovi song.
The title seemed fitting because today was the highest temperature ever measured, in the Netherlands.
Technically it was not 99 degrees, but 104 degrees Fahrenheit.
Blistering heat.

I wanted a photo of Jon taking a swim or something but ended up finding disturbingly few pictures of Jon swimming in the sea or even visiting the beach, from before 2015
I think having a vacation is a new thing for him, I really do.
Anyway, because I wanted to know if this grainy 80s pic in the Jacuzzi was the best I could do
(I’m saving 80s Jon in super tiny short for emergency pick-me-ups)

I gave it one more go, Googling Jon Bon Jovi + ice
At the word ice, I was already thinking of ice cubes, nipples, wriggling tongue around melting ice sticks.
My Google doesn’t have a filter, and neither does my imagination.
However, what I found was a lot more serious.
Jon had participated in the ALS ice bucket challenge.
I watched Jon Bon Jovi’s ice bucket challenge, and was highly surprised he nominated Tico Torres, his drummer; David Brian, his keyboard player; and Richie Sambora his guitarist.
Ex-guitarist.

Jon’s hair was already the grey and that was a post-Richie Sambora thing.
Richie left in 2013, but didn’t officially resign until 2014.
I checked the video, and it dated from August 2014.
Post-split and perhaps pre-resignation?
I don’t know.

Anyway, in an attempt to find out if Richie had answered the ice bucket challenge, I found an article that proved I wasn’t the only one surprised by Jon’s invitation to his ex-guitarist.
Article: Bon Jovi reunion fueled by ice challenge?

And there I was.
Again.

I finally had my things together with Rock Star Yoga:
A website/ this blog, a Facebook page.
I made my first public Rock Star Yoga playlist, did my practice today, and was going to write a PROPER post about it!
With yoga exercises in it, and which ones I did during each song.
It was going to be super professional, and tight!

I was no longer going to let myself be lured into the mystery that was called Bon Jovi, and in particular the story around the 2013 mid-tour departure of its guitarist.

I had already spent days and days studying it.
Writing about it.
Dreaming about it.

By now I was so deep into it, that I feared someone would one day make me pick sides or put my vision up in my Twitter bio.
Because I had written two long pieces, under my pen name, which had increased my following and had brought me new friends.

Within one week, I had gone from someone who was building her yoga business, into someone who got lost through the looking glass AND down the rabbit hole.
So the moment I officially “founded” Rock Star Yoga, this site, which up until then had “only” been a series on my YouTube;
It was more than just a business decision.
It was a life’s choice.

It was me saying:
“Fan girling days are over! Chop, chop! Take your place as a leader and go conquer the world with Rock Star Yoga!”

Yet immediately after my first successful Rock Star Yoga session, which was supposed to lead into a professional yoga blog post (this one!), with only a mild Bon Jovi reference in the title (referring to the heatwave) what do I end up doing?

Wondering about Jon’s 2014 ice bucket challenge.

Did he really hope for Richie and him to start talking again?
And if so, what happened after Richie posted his challenge?
Had Jon gotten shy, or was Richie supposed to take the initiative after Jon had made the first move?
Questions, questions.

All we know is that Richie Sambora officially resigned from Bon Jovi in 2014.
And that Suzanne Beenackers did 70 minutes of very relaxed lying around on the floor Rock Star Yoga, on Thursday July 25th, 2019.

And that I find the first a hell of a lot more fascinating.

And I probably always will.

~Suzanne

yoga log Thursday July 25: 70 minutes of yin yoga/ lying around on the floor
70 minute playlist Born Again Tomorrow
99 in the Shade is the first song.

~Suzanne

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