Jons change in voice since the 90's........

If it is due to the smoking then its very sad indeed, how somebody with a voice like he once had, could wreck it over something so stupid is beyond belief really, especially when you see how seriously he takes his role, a bit too seriously i think sometimes if the documentary is anything to go by, where was the humour in that, i enjoyed it but it seemed like a chore rather than some mates playing great music together and travelling the world.

Do you think he ever watches older performances of himself and cant believe how he hit the notes, if you watch him now its almost like he cowers as the big note is coming and just about hits it but with no power its very nasaly, where in the past he used to face it head on and hit it almost every time.

What I noticed is that after the NJ tour he wasn't able to do that really high raw voice that he did in the prayer chorus but his voice was still exceptional, it sounded more mature and trained than in the eighties. After TD (arguably his best vocals) There was a very long period where he hardly used his voice until it was time for recording crush. When he promoted DA he was singing in a really low voice and smoking too meaning a bit of a decline in his voice.

Watch one of the occasional performances Always live in 2001: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OS8ry...ayer_embedded#

His voice still sounds quite good here so I don't think he'd lost all that ability by 2001, he'd still use the howling scream in OWN. But as Bounce and HAND wore on his voice relied more and more and production effects and nasal singing to get him through. If you watch complicated live in 2005 his voice has much less power and a bit nasally:
I heard he smoked menthol cigarettes in the LH tour to try and preserve his voice, dunno if thats true But it was noticably better then HAND if you compare performances of Dry County from 2006 and 2008.

So if you can't be bothered to read all that, I'd put it down to:
1. The smoking assisted gradual deteriation.
2. Jon most likely didn't spend time getting training for his voice.
3. From 1997 - 2000 he didn't sing live much and when he did it was usually in a low voice.
4. From 2003 + the nasally voice really kicked in to help him hit the high notes.
5. As you age your voice can lose power.

Its all down to bad technique, he's singing full chest voice in the upper ranges, (which is pure raw talent) its detrimental to the voice simple as that. Thats why he lost it during the huge slippery tours you cant sing in such a way night after night. You just need to look at vocalists like steve perry, richie kotzen and richie sambora, who in the upper ranges aren't belting out in full chest voice. This is a technique you have to be taught (most of the time). Obviously smoking hasn't helped and the fact that he's getting older...

In the early stages of the KTF tour Jon really was arguably the best singer in the rock business. Look at those performances from Milan '93 or Midnight Rider from Stockholm the same month. That was incredible! The 2nd leg of that tour got weaker, also because I had the impression Jon had overused his voice a bit.

He was back into good shape on the CR tour and on the These Days tour he sang brilliant. Especially in Europe. The way he pulled of great performances of STBI, Always, BOR etc every night...that's where he gained a lot of respect from me. Nowadays those songs in one show would be enought to shoot his voice. What I constantly miss on many post-2000 performances was the soul those performances had. Just look at These Days from Helsinki 1996! This is easily my favourite show (along with Hammersmith), just because it was so intensive and tight from start to finish. You really felt that he wanted to be on stage and that he really lived for those 3 hours where he can put all in.

Then Crush came and it was disappointing. Not only that the record is one of my least favourites, these shows were always so boring to me. It may well be that his voice still was better than later (except OWN tour), but almost every show lacked something IMO. As I said, OWN was better, there were some really cool shows, especially as songs like Wild Is The Wind or even Homebound Train returned a couple of times. Plus Always. In fact, Always from Cardiff 2001 still is in my top ten of the best performances of this song.

The Bounce tour kicked off and had some of the most impressived KTF versions (Big Boom) I ever heard. You had the feeling Jon was going to scream his lungs out. Listen to the one from Anaheim and you'll get an impression of what I mean. After that, his voice started to fade drastically, the European tour was a bit disappointing as those shows often held anything special, neither with regard to his voice nor with regard to the sets. Even though there is one huge exception: MUNICH! This was my first show and I think it's fair to say that there couldn't have been a better front man on that stage that night. I never saw the band that tight again and Jon performing in a way that prooved why they became that successfull. He had the crowd lying to his feet the complete three hours! He even didn't loose them during songs like Misunderstood or Captain Crash! That was fenomenal!

The following HAND tour was the huge letdown. He was able to deliver their great ballads anymore and started hussling around with that TLFR junk songs in the set. I saw them in Hessisch Lichtenau and even though the set had plenty of surprises and I loved the show simply because I was much more a fan than I had been at that point 3 years earlier, Jon wasn't singing well. Later that year I got my first boot, the last night at Giants. And it was heartbreaking how Jon wasn't capable of delivering songs like I Am, Wild Is The Wind or These Days properly.

Afterwards the LH tour came and reached the bottom of it all during the Tokyo concert. This broadcast was plain boring, there was no energy, no soul and on top of that Jon sounded AWFUL! Really, really poor!
When they reached Munich in May, I went to see them and witnessed something I had not expected: a great show with a frontman who really wanted to be there. Yeah, he overdid it at the beginning and his voice got shot halfway through the night, but it was a great night nonetheless.
And then the night came where Jon prooved to me that he still was able to pull it all off and that he could still be that frontman entertaining the masses he used to be: Frankfurt! Damned, These Days or KTF easily pissed all over any LH show before and it was only beaten by an even better show in Amsterdam. This was the point where I knew that he still was able to deliver on stage.
For some reason he could'n even get close to that vocal power during the American shows, most of the songs on the MSG DVD indeed sound poor compared to what I hear 2 months before.

I think one thing that can be noted is that he always was better during the European shows and that marks his problem: He needs so long to get in a good shape and then a huge tourbreak puts it all down again and that's probably due to his laziness during that time. He sounded better on the KTF tour in Europe that in the USA before, better on the TD tour in Europe than in Japan before and so on...

Sure his voice changed, he is becoming older but I think with more willpower and more practice he could still constantly be on the level of the European shows last year or even higher and I could easily live with that...

[QUOTE=Matrix15;960397]

Watch one of the occasional performances Always live in 2001: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OS8ry...ayer_embedded#

His voice still sounds quite good here so I don't think he'd lost all that ability by 2001, he'd still use the howling scream in OWN. QUOTE]

Think this sounds quite poor. Very nasally. Alweeeeeeeeys. Richie backing it up quite heavily. Nothing like most of the LH performances.

I couldn't agree more! While it's still a really good performance, he sounds like he has a lot of slobber in his mouth and can't say it properly. It kind of ruins the song.

2001 sounds more like the best 1995 performances than the 2008 performances do. In '08 Jon sang the song an octave lower which, while providing a good performance, won't ever sound close to the original.

Nice review Dominik. You are completaly right.

While watching the performance of Always from 2001, it just reminded me that I don't like the direction the band has got since then. The OWN tour is the last great one for me. There are so many little facts that make it. Somnething like the stage, the layout, the number of musicians on stage, the guitars Richie play, the structure of setlist, the way Jon looks and I could go on and on. The European part of the LH tour was the great exception in the grey period they are now. In my opinion of course. That's how I perceive Bon Jovi.

And btw, I'm listening to a great show from 1989 and thinking - that this is THE BAND I love.

yeah this is a good point, you are so right......WOULD LOVE TO KNOW IF HE WATCHES AND REFLECTS OR EVEN REALISES HOW UNBELIEVABLE IT WAS!

As sad as this sounds it does 'hurt' when you listen to what we have to listen to now compared to what i personally think was THE MOST APPEALING ROCK VOICE EVER... and if you are looking for an example as proof let me give you ten!!!

i think he worked hard to make that voice a little bit better during lh and i think it worked as well as it could because in a way that always performance is weak as hell compared to wembley (which as we all know is something everyone in this world should see before they die!!!), though it was stronger than i thought he was capable of.

heres what is most noticeable.

1. no huskiness
2. no rasp or 'fire' (that explosive tail end voice he had)
3. its an old man version of the song compared to that sex appeal that it will never have again etc etc (in other words he is too old to be in touch with it properly to make you really believe him)
4. also this part between 4:19 - 4:24 comes the 'nasal' stuff. its so weak its painfull and apart from this i would expect no more from jon. (apologies to "GAZTHOMAS" who also mentioned this a few posts back because i actually wanted to quote you aswell, just don't know how, sorry!.)

all of this aside i respect the guy for performing what i personally believe was for us......even though people think all he sees is £ signs.

No he didn't, he sang it in the same octave in the same key as 1995. That said, it still sounds dreadful.