Thursday, February 14th, 2008
BON JOVI BACKS RESEARCH FOR LIVING
ON MORE THAN A PRAYER

Bon Jovi rocked for a cure at the Hammerstein ballroom- and took audience members on a walk down memory lane as they reminisced about some of their greatest hits.

“About this time in 1986, we had just finished touring.  Richie and I sat in his parents basement between laundry machines on spin cycle- and cranked this out on acoustic guitars” Jon bon Jovi said before launching into “Wanted Dead or Alive”.

The audience at the Stand up for a Cure event, filled with staff members from Sloan-Kettering hospital and their supporters, shelled out top dollar for the intimate performance.  The night benefited those battling lung cancer, a cause a near and dear to Sambora.  His father, Adam, died of the disease last April.

“My father was a huge smoker,” the guitarist told us before the show.  “He used to suck down Lucky Strip unfilters for years.  He was a big greaser in the 50’s. Watching him deteriorate was a horrible thing.  When you get that call, you are baffled.  You think, ‘this can’t be happening, ‘but if you walk into any room nearly every person in there has been touched by cancer in some way.”

Funds raised at the concert will go right into researcher’s hands.  Check out www.sufac.org. to learn more about the cause.

BON JOVI, OTHERS STAND UP FOR A CURE

Bon Jovi will perform a Feb. 12 concert to benefit Stand Up For A Cure, a non-profit organization dedicated to ending lung cancer, according to the organization’s website. The show at The Hammerstein Ballroom in New York City kicks off the organization’s 2008 concert series, which was designed to showcase top-notch talent in intimate and elegant venues.

The concert is dedicated to Richie Sambora’s father, who died last year after battling cancer. Sambora will open the show with a solo set. The sold-out show has already raised $1 million which will fund two mobile hospice units for low-income neighborhoods in new York, Sambora told Billboard.com. The units will be named after Sambora’s father, Adam Sambora.

Jerry Seinfeld, Brian Wilson and Andrea Bocceli, among others, will perform in various New York City venues throughout the year as part of the inaugural Stand Up For A Cure concert series.