Jon Bon Jovi, 62, considers fellow New Jersey rocker and friend Bruce ... trends now

As a youngster growing up in New Jersey, Jon Bon Jovi had a musical hero in Bruce Springsteen.

And in his new Hulu docuseries, the Livin' On A Prayer hitmaker, 62, opened up about the influence Springsteen has had on his life as both a rock idol and a close friend.

'Our connection is deep, on a whole different level of friendship, because how many guys can talk like we can talk, in close quarters, about life and love and loss?' he said, before adding, 'Our relationship is deep, and he's a dear friend of mine, and he really is like a big brother.'

For Bon Jovi (born John Francis Bongiovi Jr.), his first meeting with the Born To Run star turned out to be magical.

The then-high school rocker was performing a Springsteen cover at a local Jersey club when the man himself took notice and joined him on stage, according to People.

'It was so inspirational because those records by the [Asbury] Jukes, and by Bruce, were written and sung by guys in our backyard,' he explained. 'They weren’t the centerfolds of Circus magazine that made the dream just out of reach. These guys were capable of making the impossible seem possible.'

That night he got to sing the Springsteen song The Promised Land, off his fourth studio album Darkness On The Edge Of Town (1978), alongside his hero.

'I looked up, and there's Bruce onstage with me. That was the guy. And he jumps up and sings his song with me,' he confessed of the moment in the docuseries, titled Thank You, Goodnight: The Bon Jovi Story.

'So you go to high school the next day. Needless to say, you look at the teacher and you look at the kids, and you go, "I got a story to tell! and it's a lot better than history class."'

The similarities between the two stars even includes their similar upbringings in New Jersey; with the Born In The U.S.A. star growing up in Freehold, some 50 miles south of the bright lights and tall buildings of New York City, while Bon Jovi comes from Sayreville, which is just 35 miles southwest of The Big Apple.

Springsteen remembered that night when he joined the unknown young musician for the duet.

'I like to play. I think that was [what I heard], "There's some young kid running around here from New Jersey, he's making some kind of noise,"' he shared in the four-part Hulu docuseries that chronicles his epic past and unknown future.

'That was the first thing I knew about Jon. He's a hardworking guy, put everything he had into his music.'

The Boss added, 'We've become much closer, probably as we've gotten older here, you know, recently, as being the only two guys in the same game here.'

Being that the My Hometown

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