Bon Jovi – I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead Tour – 1993

September 19th 1993 – Milton Keynes Bowl

Supported by: Billy Idol, Manic Street Preachers, Little Angels

Another trip to Milton Keynes, ok, so it’s just a big field with a high bank around the edge making the bowl shape, but it was a great place to watch a concert and I think we actually broke the wet day curse on this one!!

Great for this blog, but we were entering the digital age in the early 90s, so more live material should start being available to give you an idea of what it sounded like on the day and what the bands looked like!!

I’d missed Bon Jovi in Leicester in 1986 (Slippery When Wet Tour). I don’t really know why, I’d been to Monsters of Rock that year, so would probably have been skint at the time (£12 a weekend in a camera shop wasn’t going far then).

This was a great line up and destined to be another great day out. Who says Milton Keynes is boring? 😉 In fairness to Bon Jovi, there confidence was never low and they never had a qualm about putting together a great support line-up…….unlike U2.

Maybe hard to believe these days, but you could still go down in person to get tickets from local box offices (or phone), so this was another queue at the Box office although, it was getting harder, so I think this would be the last

Little Angels

When The Little Angels are the first band on….you know you should be in for a treat with the rest of them! They didn’t mess around either straight into the hits. I guess first on, you want to make sure the crowd remembers you, they would, this was a great performance.

Set List

• She’s a Little Angel
• Young Gods (Stand Up, Stand Up)
• Boneyard
• Don’t Confuse Sex With Love
• Womankind
• Sail Away
• Too Much Too Young
• I Was Not Wrong
• Rockin’ All Over the World (John Fogerty cover)

Billy Idol

Billy had been pitched as the “Special Guest” in the run up to this concert, so it was surprising to see him as second on.

This was another of those weird moments at a concert, I don’t know why, but Billy Idol didn’t play a very long set and came on stage with…errr…..dreadlocks!! Is the really Billy?

Turned out he hadn’t played live for a long while, so wanted to trial out some new songs and get used to being on the road again.

Totally stage confident, he pranced around with his new look. Can’t say I liked the new songs, but “Rebel Yell” and “White Wedding” are timeless classics. Glad to have seen him.

Set List

• Rebel Yell
• White Wedding
• L.A. Woman(The Doors cover)
• Eyes Without a Face
• Pumping on Steel
• Heroin (The Velvet Underground cover)
• Mony Mony (Tommy James & the Shondells cover)

Manic Street Preachers

This would be the start of following a very special band, The Manic Street Preachers. Gold Against the Soul had been released in June of 1993, the second Manics album (after Generation Terrorists in 1992). This would sadly be the only time we got to see them with Richie Edwards…albeit from miles away!

The sound was raw energy, this was a young group of lads growing into their music, dressed to kill and not ashamed to try and outshine the hosts.

Straight from the off, they won over a mainly denim rock crowd “Sleepflower” was a powerful start. Some personal faves followed with “La tristesse durera”, “Slash and Burn”, the haunting “Motorcycle Emptiness” and “Repeat (UK)”.

I loved this band, such powerful sound and lyrics, topped with the passionate delivery, James Deans guitar playing was exemplary.

The arrogance and confidence to finish with “You Love Us” and exit stage left………it was if they were saying “follow that Jon Boy” 🙂

Set List

• Sleepflower
• From Despair to Where
• La tristesse durera (Scream to a Sigh)
• Slash ‘n’ Burn
• Motorcycle Emptiness
• Repeat (UK)
• Stay Beautiful
• Life Becoming a Landslide
• Roses in the Hospital
• Motown Junk
• You Love Us

Bon Jovi

How were Bon Jovi going to follow that Manics set? Well, the show started with a mass of fire flamethrowers from the stage and straight into a powerful “I Believe”……you bet this is our show Welsh Boys!! 😉

The show would just better as it went along, and Jon Bon Jovi just knows how to play and involve the crowd, straight into “Wild In The Streets” for a fast version singalong.

Keep the Faith came out in 1992 and had been a long time coming. In reality, after the fourth album “New Jersey” in 1988, Bon Jovi had split up and didn’t look like coming back. They were exhausted after continually touring, record label issues and probably, they’d had enough of each other.

This tour was the full band back together and looking like they were ready to have fun again.

• Jon Bon Jovi – lead vocals, guitar
• Richie Sambora – guitar, backing vocals
• Alec John Such – bass
• Tico Torres – drums, percussion
• David Bryan– keyboards, piano, backing vocals

It was a really lively set, full of upbeat numbers and great cover version of “Shout”. Richie’s guitar sang on “Bed of Roses” and the band were having so much fun during “Bad Medicine…and so were the crowd!!

Such a great day all round from the first band to the last. Big respect to any band that puts together such a hot line-up of music…….not a bad note all day!!

Set List

• I Believe
• Wild in the Streets
• You Give Love a Bad Name
• Born to Be My Baby
• Can’t Help Falling in Love (Elvis Presley cover)
• Bed of Roses
• Keep the Faith
• I’d Die for You
• Dry County
• Lay Your Hands on Me
• I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead
• Bad Medicine
• Shout (The Isley Brothers cover)
• Help! (The Beatles cover)
• Wanted Dead or Alive
• In These Arms
• Encore: Livin’ on a Prayer
• Blood on Blood
• I’ll Be There for You
• With a Little Help From My Friends (The Beatles cover)