Official February 10, 2013, Verizon Center, Washington D.C thread

Originally Posted by Supersonic

Aloha !



It's good if you're a die hard yeah, if you're a casual the one the band played will be deemed better considering it has a better flow.

This is your setlist in terms of familiarity:



And this is the one Jon came up with:


Don't get me wrong, I'd prefer your set over the one the band played, but when looking at what the band presented theirs is better. Just by a little bit though. It's still shit.

Originally Posted by ezearis

Here's the new opening: https://www.youtube.com/watch?featur...&v=_bdGUDPcIW8

Originally Posted by Beaky

This has been coming for a while. Jon has written the 'thoughtful, socially aware' album he has had brewing for a while and this tour marks a different Bon Jovi - one they've been morphing into for a good many years.

The new Jovi no longer open the set by grabbing your throat and your attention. They don't launch the first five songs at you like rockets, barely giving you time to breathe or realise that every inch of you in moving to the music, every part covered in sweat already. Succinctly put, they are no longer a big venue band; they just don't have the songs for it - not playing a set like that.

Jon cannot have it both ways - if he is going to stand still, play the guitar and let the music do the talking, the music has to move people; either in a tribal kind of way (KTF, RYH, LTHOM) or lyrically and musically - the PROPER version of Sat Nite, Something To Believe In, BOR... The new songs just don't hit either of those sweet spots - show me the 'moment' in these songs, the 'oh my god, I LOVE that bit, it's SO Jovi'. Show me the lyric that matches 'As I dream about movies they won't make of me when I'm dead... '

So if he wants to play his watered-down Springsteen/Mumford and Sons rip offs, fine, there's plenty who would queue around the block to hear him squeeze out a fart on stage but he has to take a step back and realise his place in music history is not as the vagabond storyteller and no matter how much he tries to bend our arms up our back to convince us, he's just going to be left playing to those people who accept him playing absolutely anything.

The joke of it is, if he did just play a load of stuff from the 80s and 90s, those who LOVE everything the band do would still be happy! I don't believe anyone wants that though but mix it up. And for God's sake, open with something that gets people's pulses raised.

I remember Milton Keynes, 96 I think it was, Wanted acoustic. At the time, it was enough to make some people say the set list was shite; looking back, I'd take that set list any day of the week now. But back then, it was Jon trying to be current, trying to be relevant and take the emphasis off of what was then a song he'd been carting all over the world for 10 years and his new, shiny material he loved and wanted everyone else to love.

The curse of an artist is not being able to see that they have had their time, their moment (or two, if they are lucky) when they are relevant and the biggest band in the world. Jon has never been able to accept this. He doesn't have anyone close to him who can tell him that he has remained at the top of the touring tree because he's the front man of the best party band in the world... they aren't U2, they aren't E Street and no one else does what they do (did) so well.

But he has to accept that if he is going to change like this; if he's going to stroll on stage, play his basic storytelling songs and wave the guitar about a bit during Captain Crash and Who Says, then his audience will change too.

People only get on their feet when you give them a reason to.

Originally Posted by TheseDaysEra

one question though: why the hell does jon brag about working out like crazy on every interview concerning his 'good genes' if he's motionless 90% of the concert ?