"If anyone is still seated, please rise for the playing of our national anthem," Jon Bon Jovi told the crowd in Value City Arena.

 

        Most of the 12,500 fans in attendance Wednesday night had stood for more than two hours, then remained standing as Bon Jovi played the final encore, Dead or Alive.

 

         They even helped sing the first verse.

         "I didn’t like how Cleveland (site of the previous night’s show) went down," Jon Bon Jovi said after the band charged through the opening numbers, the Bob Dylan tribute Last Man Standing and You Give Love a Bad Name. "So we’re going to rip the . . . roof off this place."

 

         The former janitor and sometime actor worked up a sweat during 23 songs. He danced, mugged for the video camera, played guitars, talked in a New Jersey accent and threw back all the red roses that the predominantly female audience gave him.

 

          He entered the audience to sing Blaze of Glory and quickly returned to the neon-tubed stage.

 

          His band rocked, too. Heather Locklear’s husband, Richie Sambora, wore a gold jacket and jaunty fedoras, smiled as he strummed and used the Talk Box tube to sing through his guitar on Livin’ on a Prayer and other songs. Sheepdog-looking David Bryan pounded the keyboards, although he was heard mainly on song introductions such as Runaway. And Tico Torres proved to be a monster drummer, providing a blistering beat. Hugh McDonald (bass), Bob Bandiera (guitar) and Jeff Kazee (keyboards) stayed mostly in the background.

 

           Bon Jovi pushed all the right buttons. The band played half of its winning new album, Have a Nice Day; had a nice breather with an accordion-driven Bed of Roses; threw in most of its hits (alas, no Keep the Faith) along with a couple of good album tracks (I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead, The Radio Saved My Life Tonight and Someday I’ll Be Saturday Night); and even revived the oldie-but-goodie Treat Her Right.

 

           Bon Jovi is easily dismissed as a hair-metal band whose glory days lasted from 1987 to 1990.

 

          More recently, though, the musicians have released the interesting albums Bounce and Crush, the irresistible hit It’s My Life and the unusual boxed set 100,000,000 Bon Jovi Fans Can’t Be Wrong. In 2003, they rearranged a dozen hits for the appealing album This Left Feels Right. Their latest might be their best-written album yet. Therefore, the group is still growing musically. The central Ohio rock quintet Introspect played first. The band, which won the spot, is competing again to open for Bon Jovi in the summer at Giants Stadium in East Rutherford, N.J.

 

[email protected]