Unpopular opinion

That's a special song for me. I listened to it on a daily basis during a tough time of my life and it helped me keep going. Pretty much all good now but it still have a place in my heart.

Seven Years Gone and You Can Only Get So High were some of the best songs from the BJ camp in the last 15 years for me. Actually, with the odd exception on BB (which might've been recorded before), nothing after it came close to it.
You Can Only Get So High strikes a lot harder knowing what it was about and what came afterwards.

So I guess this is more of a conspiracy theory rather than unpopular opinion....

A few songs on SWW and NJ were actually written by Ghost writers and Jon/Richie had little or no involvement in them.

I'm basing my theory on this. This exact thing someone posted on twitter in response to a someone else's post on something Jovi. They were claiming to have heard from good sources that many of the songs on these two albums were written by another songwriter who was in another New Jersey rock band and wrote songs for a West Coast Rock band. This got me thinking about if this could be true or not and from listening to other songs that this song writer had written for his own band, they did strike me to be in the more in the style of Let it Rock, Raise Your Hands etc than Jon and Richie's own song writing had been for the first two albums. Then I saw an interview with Desmond Child on You Tube in which he told the story that he was offered a lot of money ($35k i think it might have been) to drop his name from You Gove Love a Bad Name and in effect be a Ghost Writer of the song). This kind of gives some credence to the theory as it shows that it was something Jovis manager was obviously be prepared to do and if there had been other writers who had co wrote or wrote for the band then they would likely have had the same type of offer!

The type of songs are on SWW are lyrically much more commercial, have a good time kind of lyrics than on the previous two albums and I therefore wonder if it hadn't been for ghost writers and Desmond Child if the band wouldn't have done something much more in keeping with the previous two albums and never have made that leap to superstardom. Certainly looking at many of the tracks that didn't make SWW, e.g. Borderline, Out of Bounds, Game of the Heart, Deep Cuts the Knife etc they are much more in the genre of not so commercial noir rock of the first two albums.

Oh and Social Disease - how the hell had Aerosmith heard this and wanted it, if it wasn't being offered around to different bands? What made them think they could have it?

Thoughts on the above theory (which would rely on people signing NDAs) much appreciated.

I have often wondered about those songs that didnt make SWW = They were very first 2 album sounding. I presume that DC came in, helped write Bad Name and Prayer and they were so different that Jon and Richie then changed their style or DC pointed out that what was witten before he came along were where they were going wrong as they were no different to first 2 albums and the 3rd album was make or break for the band so write other songs.

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I know many people like the "rockier" songs with Phil since he joined but I can't stand his guitar tone in those. Don't get me wrong, nothing against Phil and in his solo videos, I like his tone more.
But it's always mixed so "thin and cheap" sounding with some distortion in it. I recently experimented with creating stems from the tracks and was taken aback with how it sounded. And it always sounds the same, from the Devil's In The Temple to Beautiful Drug to Let It Rain and so on.
Hoping for something different in terms of tone and sound on the new album.

Agreed. If he had a richer, fuller tone I think everything would sound so much better (Though it's bonkers he didn't play on Devils in the Temple. That songs needs a Phil solo bad)

So the opening riff was Shanks emulating Phil? It sounds so like Phil but yeah, I remember he was on only like 4 songs on the album?

My unpopular opinion

Fast Cars is a song I really like.

I broke it down a little on my podcast the other day and said it could be for nostalgia reasons (probably is more than anything) as that was a time in my life I loved. I was finishing school, playing PlayStation all the time with 'The Circle' album on

What a life.

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Adding on that: I really like Shanks' guitar on the albums. He knows how to sound just like Richie and when to go to other directions.

i dont mind fast cars...cant stand bullet- thats a mess of a song

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