# It's My Life (Bon Jovi song)

"It's My Life" is a song by American rock band Bon Jovi. It was released on May 8, 2000, as the lead single from their seventh studio album, Crush (2000). It was written by Jon Bon Jovi, Richie Sambora, and Max Martin, and co-produced by Luke Ebbin. The song peaked at number one in Austria, Flanders, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, Romania, Spain, and Switzerland while charting within the top 10 across several other countries and peaking at number 33 on the US Billboard Hot 100. "It's My Life" is Bon Jovi's most well-known post-1980s hit single and helped introduce the band to a new, younger fanbase.

## Background

The song has many classic Bon Jovi features, such as Sambora's use of the talk box, and a line in the second verse "For Tommy and Gina, who never backed down" refers to Tommy and Gina, a fictional working class couple that Bon Jovi and Sambora first wrote about in their 1986 hit "Livin' on a Prayer".
"It's My Life" is also notable for its line referencing fellow New Jerseyan Frank Sinatra: "My heart is like an open highway / Like Frankie said / I did it 'My Way'." Jon Bon Jovi and Richie Sambora apparently had a disagreement over those lines, with Bon Jovi recalling:
   I had just come home from making U-571 and I said "Sinatra made 16 movies and toured till he was 80. This is my role model." He [Sambora] said, "You can't write that damn lyric. Nobody cares about Frank Sinatra but you." And I wrote it anyway.
In Paul Anka's cover of the song for his 2005 album Rock Swings, he sings the second line as "Frankie said he did it my way", since Anka wrote the English lyrics for "My Way".

## Reception

"Nobody had anticipated the song 'It's My Life'," noted Jon Bon Jovi in 2007. "Except us. We knew we had a hit." The song became an anthem that appealed to many fans. As Bon Jovi later stated: "I thought I was writing very self-indulgently about my own life and where I was in it. I didn't realize that the phrase 'It's My Life' would be taken as being about everyone – by teenagers, by older guys, mechanics, whatever. 'It's my life, and I'm taking control.' Everyone kind of feels that way from time to time."
Veteran critic Robert Christgau later hailed "It's My Life" as a "schlock-rock masterpiece" and "everyman anthem" with a lyric that is "all well-meaning Democrat-as-everyman Jon Bon Jovi".

## Music video

The music video was directed by Wayne Isham. Will Estes (as Tommy) and Shiri Appleby (as Gina) are the two main characters. At the beginning, Tommy is watching a video of a Bon Jovi concert on his computer when he is ordered by his mother to take out the trash. Suddenly, Gina calls and tells him to immediately come to the tunnel as the live concert has already started. Tommy starts running down to his apartment and obediently takes out the trash. He then runs through the streets of Los Angeles up to the concert, getting chased by dogs, taking pictures of Elvis impersonators, running a marathon and jackknifing a truck. The video was inspired by the film Run Lola Run. Jon Bon Jovi met Estes on the set of U-571 and chose him to be in the video. The music video features the 2nd Street Tunnel as one of the main settings.
It is the most viewed video for Bon Jovi on YouTube, reaching 1 billion views (the band's first song to do so) by the end of June 2021.

## Acoustic version

A much slower, acoustic ballad version of the song is featured on Bon Jovi's 2003 album This Left Feels Right, a collection of their greatest hits that were adapted into new formats. This version was also released as a single. A live performance was uploaded to YouTube in May 2020.

## Awards

Won:
* "Video of the Year" at the VH1 My Music Awards
* Chosen as one of the greatest songs of the year at the ASCAP Pop Music Awards
Nominated:
* "Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal" at the 43rd Grammy Awards, but lost to U2's "Beautiful Day"

## Certifications

| Region | Certification | Certified units/sales |
| Australia (ARIA) | 6× Platinum | 420,000$^‡$ |
| Austria (IFPI Austria) | Platinum | 50,000$^*$ |
| Belgium (BEA) | Platinum | 50,000$^*$ |
| Brazil (Pro-Música Brasil) | Gold | 30,000$^‡$ |
| Denmark (IFPI Danmark) | Platinum | 90,000$^‡$ |
| France (SNEP) | Gold | 250,000$^*$ |
| Germany (BVMI) | Platinum | 500,000$^^$ |
| Italy (FIMI) | Platinum | 50,000$^‡$ |
| Japan (RIAJ) PC download | Gold | 100,000$^*$ |
| Japan (RIAJ) Full-length ringtone | Gold | 100,000$^*$ |
| Netherlands (NVPI) | Gold | 40,000$^^$ |
| New Zealand (RMNZ) | 2× Platinum | 60,000$^‡$ |
| Spain (PROMUSICAE) | 2× Platinum | 120,000$^‡$ |
| Sweden (GLF) | Platinum | 30,000$^^$ |
| Switzerland (IFPI Switzerland) | Platinum | 50,000$^^$ |
| United Kingdom (BPI) | 2× Platinum | 1,200,000$^‡$ |
| United States (RIAA) | 3× Platinum | 3,000,000$^‡$ |
| $^*$ Sales figures based on certification alone. $^^$ Shipments figures based on certification alone. $^‡$ Sales+streaming figures based on certification alone. |||

## Release history

| Region | Date | Format(s) | Label(s) |
| United States | May 8, 2000 | Hot adult contemporary radio | Island |
| United States | May 9, 2000 | Contemporary hitmainstream rockactive rock radio | Island |
| Japan | May 10, 2000 | CD | Mercury |
| United Kingdom | May 22, 2000 | CDcassette | Mercury |

## Pitbull version

At the 25th Annual Latin Grammy Awards on November 14, 2024, rapper Pitbull performed a cover of "It's My Life" under the title "Now or Never", featuring Jon Bon Jovi on chorus. The song was also released on streaming platforms on the same day.
The two artists first met at the 2017 Songwriters Hall of Fame. On September 12, 2024, during Pitbull's show at the Jones Beach Theater in Long Island, Jon Bon Jovi made a surprise appearance before the duo performed "It's My Life". After the show, Pitbull posted on his Instagram account: "Always an honor! To all the fans, get ready for our new collab coming soon."
The song hit number thirty-six on Billboard's Pop Airplay chart in 2025, becoming Bon Jovi's first song to chart on that chart since Who Says You Can't Go Home hit number thirty nearly 20 years ago.