This was the first time I saw Jon actually getting into the song. I’ve seen the song performed multiple times; a few times in America and one time in Europe as well. I never quite got why Americans were raving about this song when it was performed in arena’s over there, but they kept trying to convince me that Jon was always trying to sell the song a lot more than the times I saw it being performed. I never quite got to see that, until I saw him sing the song in Milan, putting more passion and excitement into it than any of the new songs, and this indicating right away why the new songs go over like a lead balloon. But not Love’s The Only Rule. If Jon had been capable of selling every song of the night like he tried to sell this one, it’d have easily been one of the best Bon Jovi shows I’ve ever seen, but he didn’t, which was exactly the problem. He turned Love’s The Only Rule into a highlight for me, despite me thinking it’s an average song. He brought new life to it with the multiple build ups and belted out the chorus like a true singer should. The song did bring back the memories of times that seem like as if they belong to a former life as I was reminded of a time when we both believed in each other, and as cheesy as it may sound, when love truly was the only rule for us. When there was nothing that could stop us, and the dedication and conviction we had for each other was captured in that one performance in Milan. During that performance, everything fell into place, and for the first time that night it felt like crowd and band were one. It showed that when the front man of Bon Jovi is on fire, you just don’t need an average Richie Sambora to keep this band alive, a thing I didn’t expect to happen either. Love’s The Only Rule was truly one of the highlights of the show, and was a good reminder of what this band, but especially Jon, is capable off when willing to show off what he’s got, as opposed to resting on his laurels and thinking just singing the hits is good enough. Alright, enough Kuba talk there.

The obligatory Wanted Dead Or Alive followed, I don’t particularly care for this song anymore, but don’t get all worked up about Richie not being there either. I’m having none of this sentimental “Richie needs to be there for this one because of the brotherhood OMG!!11one” bullshit. I pretty much zone out whenever Wanted gets played until the electric guitar solo kicks in, because that’s where technicians to this day still manage to mess up. It was a solid rendition, nothing more nothing less.
But there was another surprise, one I absolutely didn’t expect. It was obviously planned in advance, though Jon likes to pretend he plays requests from banners (we can’t have anything spontaneous in the show, right?), but I was surprised to see him give this particular song an outing. There was some nonsense story about the venue reminding him of the Twin Towers, and I’m not particularly sure how an American from the New York area would’ve felt about that comment as it felt a bit like using the tragedy to sell the song to this audience, but maybe that’s just me? I did get very excited hearing this one live again though, the last time I heard it was 2003 so it was a welcome surprise. Unfortunately, it wasn’t that great a performance. The song has been played too slow ever since it was incorporated in the American set lists of 2003, and has always lacked the punch the album version has, much like tonight. On top of that, the brother and I were interrupted by 2 guys in the crowd who really wanted to have their picture taken with us because we are so tall. I kid you not, we were asked to pose with complete strangers. I missed the guitar solo because of this, but after checking youTube it turned out there wasn’t one to begin with. So yeah, Undivided was a nice surprise but it lacked the drive and punch Love’s The Only Rule had.

A rousing rendition of Have A Nice Day followed though it’s become another one of those where I zone out because it’s become another one of those new songs that’s played live exactly like the album version. Whatever happened to changing new songs in a live environment in order to make them differ from the static album versions of the past 10 years? It’s another reason why the set lists have become so boring. Anything pre-2000 would be turned into a different beast when played live. Will we ever get to hear an It’s My Life with extended talk box solo? A Capt. Crash spiced up with a few covers? The band seems to come to life whenever a chance is made or a cover song is added to a song, yet we are being offered the same renditions of the same songs over and over again. Changing the arrangements slightly can breathe new life into an otherwise rather overplayed song. This goes for the renditions of Bad Name and Prayer as well, the latter one finally being changed a bit with it having the acoustic intro. But why repeat the first verse? Sure enough, once Prayer was started no one seems to mind as this is an all-time classic and that Italian crowd was loud! But for a fan who has seen every tour in the past 20 years, or even 10 years, it gets rather predictable. Now before you start the “You’re in the minority” talk, yes, I’m well aware of that. But it goes back to the same excuse of not willing to change things up. Don’t get me wrong, I still like Prayer live despite Jon sounding like a strangled cat for the most parts (Thammyusedtawahkondadahks) but it’s had the same arrangement for years now. Play an acoustic verse + chorus and kick right into the song, as opposed to once again starting the keyboard intro. It killed the momentum quite a bit. That said, hearing Jon play it on an acoustic like this did feel a bit like a treat, and for the first time in years I felt he managed to make a stadium show intimate.

A second encore was kind of expected considering how well this first encore went down. Once Jon came back with his acoustic I feared for I Love This Town but fortunately it was the small snippet of Never Say Goodbye, a thing of which I don’t understand why he’s not just playing the full rendition. It’s not as if it goes down poorly on the crowd, many people know this over here as it was released on Cross Road (America’s version of Cross Road lacked this one), so chances are everyone has heard it, despite the latest Greatest Hits lacking this one. But no, we got a verse and a chorus, and the band kicked into Always. I expected Jon to murder this one, but he got away with it better than I expected. As a matter of fact, I realized by now that his vocals were so, so much better during the encore than they’d been for the entire main set. I’d have loved to hear a good outro solo by Phil X because he seems to be nailing this one as of lately, but alas this was not the case due to the shitty sound that had been bothering me for the entire show. We could barely hear him still while you’d think they’d have solved it by the end of the show. Bon Jovi has never had a good sound compared to other stadium acts but this was just really, really bad. Always wasn’t though, I enjoyed it. And once Jon got back his acoustic I once again thought we’d get I Love This Town, but nope. These Days followed, much to the delight of the brother. Now I know I’m going to upset a few people here, but I don’t particularly care for These Days anymore. Yes, it’s a good song, but the way Jon sings it makes it lose all its power. Besides, the guitar solo’s supposed to rip into it after the bridge, and such a thing rarely happens anymore as its lost most of its punch since 2008. I don’t really understand why Jon keeps playing this song of the These Days album as I feel Hey God or Damned are better songs, but again, that might be just me. And I’m not complaining about getting this one instead of ****ing I Love This Town.