Excellent post Seb!! I totally agree. I dont think I noticed the similarity properly until I started listening to bootlegs.

For me though, its not just the tracks that are played each night, its also Jons speachers. They have changed slightly over the years, but not an awful lot. I love it when he tells a story, rather than just the same old sh!t every night. Jon has definately changed since the 80's, even in the 90's it was different. My point is though that each night on the same tour is pretty much the same. It was extremely boring during the Bounce Tour when he kept mentioning the "you guys have stuck with us for the past twenty years and i want to thank you for that". I can see that being mentioned again next tour, which will probably bore us to death.

As far as the setlists are concerned. It really cant be that hard to vary them each night. Throwing in one or even two 'rare' tracks would be the highlight of so many fans night. I would never expect the band to remove, prayer, bad name, bad medicine, sleep, wanted, IML, etc...they are always going to be for keeps coz it keeps probably 70-80% of the audience happy. All we want as hardcore/diehard fans is a song, using Sebs example Hey God for example, to send us home happy.

The 'casual' fan will certainly not go home disappointed if they couldnt sing along two one or two tracks. They would still be extrmely happy to have heard all the greatest hits, and the odd 'rare' track that I mentioned could possibly entice them to go out and purchase an older album which could lead them into becomming a bigger fan.

I dont know why Jon and the band can't work on this. Songs that they havent played for years can still be played, it cant take that long to go back over the guitar chords. Look at Living In Sin for example that was played at the Giants Stadium at the Homecoming in 2003. The crowd loved that, as it was a rare song. They should be able to surprise the crowd at least once a night or it really isnt worth the entrance fee.