Random Thoughts While Listening To "Runaway" by Bon Jovi

Special thanks to Eastern Iowa radio, where music stopped before the 90s ever began.

• You know what that intro keyboard symbolizes? The period in my life between getting wood and getting laid.
• Best rock name ever: Kiss guitarist Ace Frehley. Worst: Bon Jovi drummer Tico Torres
• I first heard this song while watching MTV at my grandfather’s house. He had cable, and we did not. In fact, everybody I knew back then didn’t have cable, but their grandparents did, and all they used it for was to watch regular TV. It was like they didn’t know there were any channels after 13. Meanwhile, we’d go visit, give them a hug, wait to see if they'd give us money, and then head straight from the living room to get revved up watching ZZ Top videos. I still remember the girls getting out of the car during “Legs”—that was they day I became a man.
• When you make a list of “most underrated rock guitarists in history,” you can safely leave Richie Sambora off that list.
• I didn’t like any 80s metal band that had a full-time keyboard player. You could use keyboards and still rock (like Ozzie’s “Mr. Crowley”). You could have somebody play keyboards and something else. But having a dedicated ivory tickler meant your band was for girls.
• Any guy that was a Bon Jovi fan was considered a pussy by other guys. It was like being a fan of Poison or Warrant. Bands like those were chick metal that you only put up with because girls would listen to them while you made out. You wouldn’t be caught dead cranking Bon Jovi outside of trying to stretch a single into a double in the back of the station wagon.
• Def Leppard were the exception to that rule. They could write the same pansy-ass power ballad as everybody else, but because they were English and their drummer had one arm, they were cool. That was Bon Jovi’s double curse—being from Jersey, and having a fully-limbed Tico Torres.
• I’ll bet I’ve just thought more about Tico Torres than the other members of Bon Jovi combined.