Jon Bon Jovi - Janie, Don't Take Your Love To Town

What this video is

Released in 1997 as the third UK single from Jon Bon Jovi's solo album Destination Anywhere, 'Janie, Don't Take Your Love to Town' emerged as part of a multimedia artistic statement in which the album was paired with a 48-minute companion film directed by Mark Pellington and debuted on MTV and VH1. The song and its video exist within a deliberate creative pivot: Bon Jovi was distancing himself from the bombastic…

Why it matters

The video is a significant artifact of the late-90s crossover between promotional music video and short-form prestige filmmaking. It exemplifies a brief but culturally notable trend in which major rock artists used album-length companion films and noir-inflected video aesthetics to signal artistic…

The director

Wayne Isham (born December 2, 1958, Vinita, Oklahoma) is an American music video and film director. He attended the University of California, Santa Barbara. Isham directed over 150 music videos and is a defining figure in the arena-rock video aesthetic of…