I'm A Contest,
On A Steel Horse I RideWay back in July 1995, I announced this really stupid contest. Remember? I invited readers to send in the dumbest Bon Jovi lyrics they could find. What a concept. I also revealed my favorite Bon Jovi line:
"When you breathe, I want to be the air for you"
I love that. Anyway, a bunch of you were brave enough to search your memories and your dusty tape collections, and you found some brilliant lyrics by those champions of eighties haircut rock. I suspected that if any Bon Jovi line would receive multiple entries, it would be this one:
"Remember when we lost the keys/And you lost more than that in my back seat, baby"
Checking in with that charmer were both Maria Knopp (who recalled that the song - "Never Say Goodbye" - was banned from her high school prom) and Stacy Estep (with a very different story: "As a member of the class of 1987, it's my right to quote this omnipresent prom song whenever I wish!"). Stacy also uncovered the following atrocities buried on the Young Guns II soundtrack:
"I'm a devil on the run, a six-gun lover, a candle in the wind, yeah!"
"You brought a knife out to a gunfight and you're shouting that I'm dead/My old friends Smith & Wesson think you're in over your head"
While we're exploring Jon's sensitive Western period, here are Christy Costello's findings, also from Young Guns II:
"The river of your hope is flooded and I know the dam is busted"
"We were as still as the wind that blows on a hot August night"
Christy (who actually sent me a copy of the whole tape) (but it's okay, we're still friends) also found this line, which isn't really funny, but certainly appropriate:
"I don't claim to be a wise man, a poet, or a saint"
And now a message from Andy Robinson: "Dumbest Bon Jovi lyrics, huh? Hmm. Well, I'm feeling kinda unhip right now because I never followed his career very closely. I don't have all the B-sides and import singles, so I'm gonna be strapped to the obvious here, but you know I've always thought "I've seen a million faces, and I've rocked them all!" (accompanied by meaningless megalomaniacal hand gesture, just like in the video) was pretty creepy. What does that mean? 'Hey man, did you go to the Bon Jovi show?' 'Dude, that guy ROCKS MY FACE!' I don't get it."
And here is something completely incomprehensible from the New Jersey album, courtesy of Derek Anderson:
"Light a candle, blow the world away/Table for two on a TV tray"
What? Anyway, I certainly don't know enough about music to choose the winner, so I let a rabbit make the decision. The NYN Contest Staff arranged all the entries in a big circle on the floor. We then placed a hyperactive rabbit named Blanche in the middle of the circle. For scientific purposes, we had a control group of rabbits in the next room placed in circles of White Lion lyrics.
No, no, I made that part up. Actually, there was just Blanche, who hopped straight to the entry of Andy Robinson! Way to go! Andy wins an impossible-to-find demo tape of dance/pop music by vocalist Lisa Romsey (produced by Ed, the musical half of the Sponge Awareness Foundation!). I'm sure Andy will rock every face in Chicago with tunes like "Tell Me You Love Me" and "Boy You Drive Me Wild."
The other contestants will receive a handy reference book called New Kids on the Block (1989, Modern Publishing). That's right, I have enough copies to go around. Don't ask. This book provides instant access to data such as Donnie Wahlberg's favorite saying: "Peace Out!"
Meanwhile, Blanche has been hired to produce the next Richie Sambora solo album.
A couple of entries were disqualified, so that the integrity of the contest would not be compromised. Matt submitted this suspicious lyric:
"I'd live for you, I'd die for you, I'd eat a big apple pie for you"
I was pretty sure that wasn't a real Bon Jovi line, but it really sounds like one, doesn't it? A call to Matt confirmed that he made the whole thing up. Cheater.
Then Ed called and really confused me by offering this line:
"You can smell it by the bogs"
It sounded familiar, and with good reason. I soon remembered that it's a line from one of our songs! One of the darkest secrets in Sponge Awareness history is the time, many years ago, when Ed was asked to write a song about the town of Carver, Massachusetts. I slapped together the opening verse, easily the sappiest, goofiest nonsense ever written. Ed hacked out the rest, and we made a hideous demo recording. It was a tricky song to compose, since we knew nothing about Carver except that it was full of cranberry bogs (the "it" in the line quoted above refers to "Carver Spirit," which was also the title of the song). The scariest thing was that the guy from the Carver Celebration Committee (or whatever it was) really liked it! Luckily, the whole project somehow fell apart, and I believe I have the only remaining copy of the song. If you want to hear it, you'll have to kill me first.
For their fake entries, Matt and Ed will each receive a can of Spam that has been juggled on television. Meanwhile, Matt has been hired to write the next eleven Bon Jovi albums.
Finally, we have this note from Valerie Shustack: "I apologize for not entering the Bon Jovi contest. Although I owned Slippery When Wet in junior high, I can't remember any good lyrics. Sadly, the tape has disappeared!"
You know, maybe Valerie is the real winner.
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