Back In The Game A Little Older, A Little Smarter, Bon Jovi Is In A Brilliant New Phase Of Its Evolution

Usually a greatest hits package signifies the end of a stage of an act’s career. For Bon Jovi, it proclaimed a rebirth.

After 1992’s double-platinum “Keep The Faith” failed to reach the levels of 1986’s 11-times platinum “Slippery When Wet” or 1988’s sextuple-platinum “New Jersey,” many wrote the band off. Then came “Cross Road.”

The band’s greatest hits album, released last November, became PolyGram’s biggest seller worldwide for 1994 in just six weeks.

Already certified double platinum in the United States, the collection has sold more than 13 million copies around the globe and spawned the international smash “Always.” “Always” hit No. 4 on Billboard’s Hot 100, making it the band’s first top 10 hit since 1989’s “Living In Sin.”

(“Blaze Of Glory,” a No. 1 hit in 1990, came from Jon Bon Jovi’s solo album.)

But whether the underdog or king of the hill, bandleader Jon Bon Jovi says what matters is staying in the race.

“One thing I’ve learned with experience is don’t make too much of the good, if you can’t make enough of the bad,” he says.

“I couldn’t pay too much heed to people saying, ‘It’s over - ‘Keep The Faith’ didn’t work,’ and then jump up and down with the greatest hits. This is a long road, and this is just another exit on it.”

The current “exit” is a new album called “These Days,” which Mercury will release Tuesday.

The album, produced by Peter Collins, Bon Jovi and guitarist Richie Sambora, is the band’s sharpest, most mature effort to date with crisp rockers like “Something For The Pain” and the lovely, stripped down, acoustic ballad “Diamond Ring.”

“I think it’s the most introspective record we’ve done,” says Bon Jovi, who wrote all the songs on the album, including cowriting several with Sambora and tunesmith Desmond Child. “We’ve grown as writers.”

In addition to seeing Jon Bon Jovi on stage, he’ll also soon be seen on screen in the movie “Moonlight And Valentino,” which is coming to theaters in the fall. Bon Jovi plays a painter in the film.

“Acting in that movie was one of the three great experiences in my life,” says Bon Jovi. “The others being the birth of my kids and the first time we played Giants Stadium.”

Regarding future film roles, he says, “I’m not going to quit my day job, but I am going to continue to do movies as an outlet.”

Although Bon Jovi won’t arrive stateside until midsummer, the band is already on the road. The tour began in Bombay, India, simply for the adventure of it. (“It’s not an adventure starting a tour in Pensacola, now is it?” says Bon Jovi.)

The band will play stadium dates alone until late May, when it hooks up with Van Halen, who will open dates for Bon Jovi throughout Europe.

Bon Jovi will act as the warm-up when it fulfills a dream by playing with the Rolling Stones for two dates in Paris.

“I wrote Mick Jagger a note, like a 16-year-old kid,” says Bon Jovi.

“It said, ‘Dear Mick, Can I please open for you? I’d be honored to carry your luggage any day of the week.’ And the band said, ‘Sure, how about Paris?’ It’s a big thrill to be playing with the world’s greatest rock ‘n’ roll band.”

Bon Jovi will begin its domestic tour in midsummer.

Busy as this schedule sounds, Bon Jovi hasn’t forgotten the fog that the first 10 years of his band’s career became - one continuous, uncontrollable blur of touring and recording, with total exhaustion being the one constant. And he has vowed to never let that happen again.

“There’s no more trying to fit other people’s schedules and this and that for the sake of the machine. If I’m having a blast, hallelujah, and if I’m not, I’m gone,” he says.

“I told my office (we’ll do) 125 shows, and right now it’s at 123, and they’re begging me for 25 more, and I’m like, ‘Hey, it is what it is, guys,’ and we’re going to have fun and we’re going to walk away from this one smiling.”