Quote:
Originally Posted by JackieBlue
"This isn’t a band that is dependent on the guitar player like Van Halen or U2 or something, it was about the songs and it was about me."
I guess his appreciation of Richie is why Jon's done everything he can do to downplay Richie's contributions since HAND; not to mention trying to place sole blame for the split on Richie's "issues" to avoid questions about any responsibility he may have had... "There was no fight" my Aunt Fanny!  
But I'm curious. Short of "Richie letting him and the band down" what have you seen over the last 10 or 15 years that makes you think Richie appreciated Jon less than Jon appreciated him?
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Don't know, for several years from roughly HAND era onwards it just felt like Jon wanted to keep things rolling as they'd done until then, acknowledging and supporting Richie during hard times (with the 2007 disaster probably being the most prominent example) and still at least trying to be friends with him, but as Richie was already going way off the rails during the European leg in '06, something basically seemed to go wrong in his (RS) head for good, and since then he seemed somewhat unhappy with the band and Jon (especially with his position of "trying to keep Jon happy" as stated on the WWWB documentary), wasn't appreciating the band's decisions but was rather desperate to go more for his own tangents (e.g. the moronic football match incident in January '13, when he didn't show up for the BBC TV rehearsal), and started to act increasingly in this arrogant/off-the-cuff manner he still does today.
It's hard to say for sure, but I personally have a hard time believing there isn't more to all of this mess than Richie's alcoholism or the personal differences of him and Jon. I simply don't think Richie is quite right on the head in general - yeah, I know this is a harsh way to put it, but to me he's always seemed a bit "weird". Be it something like bipolar disorder or just some milder mental attributes (e.g. ADHD or the likes), but I just somehow have a gut feeling that Richie has never quite known what to do with himself or his life. And judging by his recent appearances, it also seems like he never will.