Desmond Child has enough hits to fill a jukebox — several times over. The Grammy-winning songwriter has notched an astonishing 80 entries on the Billboard Top 40 over the course of his five-decade career, during which time he’s penned classics for some of the biggest movers and shakers in music history.Bon Jovi,Cher,Aerosmith, KISS,Kelly Clarkson,Sia,Garth Brooks,Katy Perry,Christina Aguilera,Ricky Martinand so many more have given voice to his songs, which have sold over 500 million records worldwide and racked up billions of streams.
On Friday, the 65-year-old released his first live album,Desmond Child Live. Recorded at New York’s iconic Feinstein’s/54 Below (formerly home to the famous Studio 54 disco), the album features Child tackling some of his biggest smashes, including “Livin’ La Vida Loca,” “Livin’ on a Prayer” and so many more. In honor of the new release (and his upcoming memoir cowritten with David Ritz due out in 2020) PEOPLE presents the stories behind some of his most famous songs — in Child’s own words.
In my case, I was thinking about the early hungry years in N.Y.C. in the late 1970s with my girlfriend, Maria Vidal, who was also co-founder of our band, Desmond Child & Rouge. Maria worked as a singing waitress at a joint called Once Upon a Stove, where they named her Gina Velvet. I stayed home writing songs and she worked “to bring home her pay for love.” After Bon Jovi did the demo, Jon wasn’t sure about putting it on the album because he felt it was a bit sentimental and didn’t fit with the hard-edged arena rock direction they were headed in. But Richie and I realized early on that this was a very special song and literally got on our hands and knees, half joking and half not, begging Jon to keep it on the record. The rest is history.
Today, “Livin’ on a Prayer” has become the number one anthem of hope for all time … and the number one song played in strip clubs and bars at the end of the night to get people on their feet and out the door. I’m not kidding. In fact, we once got a letter from a guy who had decided to end his life and had pulled up at a bridge leaving the car still running. As he prepared to jump, “Livin’ on a Prayer,” his favorite song, came on the radio, so he decided to get back in to hear it one last time. By the time the modulation kicked in at the last chorus, he drove home. So Bon Jovi has actually saved a life!
Ricky Martin exploded all over Latin America with his solo career after having aged out of the Puerto Rican boy band Menudo and set his sights on the U.S. and international market. He needed a smash cross-over single for his debut English-language album, so I got together with his producer, Draco Rosa, and we got fascinated with the idea of Ricky as the “Latin Elvis.” But why stop there? Sinatra had just passed away and his records were playing all over the airwaves. Ricky had his own version of that sexy Elvis and Sinatra swag.
Rogers & Cowan
source: people.com
