Can you hear Richie's absence from THINFS?

Honestly, safe for the slightly disoriented solo, I can't. The last song I remember which sounded distinctly like Richie wrote certain parts is probably Thorn In My Side or Bullet, neither of which was released as a single. The last prominent backing vocal I can remember goes as far back as The Distance, even.

Sometime's it's hard to tell who contributed what but as far as backing vocals go he is missed. It was him 90 percent of the time, usually giving it his all so even when the guitar playing was watered down by the book I knew we'd get some good vocals out of it. Guitar playing wise the difference is negligible. The solo isn't hooky, would have loved a memorable Richie solo.

It's deafening.

As I've said before, it is Jon PLUS Richie that made Bon Jovi a premium brand. They are out a co-composer, co-lyricist, lead backup singer and co-onstage presence as well as a lead guitarist, and it shows very much.

My take is it's deafening but it's as deafening as it's always been for the post 2000 era. The songs coming out don't lend itself well for his playing. He was a co-composer, co-lyricist and co-onstage presence for all of the recent albums and the vanilla guitar parts could have been anyone. This song included.

It's kind of weird how people critisize the solo for not sounding Richie enough, I think it sounds exactly like Richie, which is my only gripe with the song. It could almost get confused with the Lost Highway solo just in a different key....

So let me get this straight,

It's "deafening" and easy to tell there's no Richie in this song?

Are you serious? The guitar parts for the last several albums, minus a few, could have been played by anyone.

This solo could have very easily been Richie. We just know it's not because he's no longer in the band.

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To me, Richie was pretty absent from What About Now anyway. I don't believe he was around for much of the sessions and when he was he was phoning it in. He had lost the passion for the band by this point and his stamp is missing from that whole album.

Classic Richie hasn't been heard on a BJ release for a long time anyways, so this sounds no different than the last few records. Compare it to Bounce, for instance, then Richie's absence is glaringly obvious...

Honestly... No... I said to a friend who's a casual fan I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing... But no I really hear no difference maybe adds fuel to the fire that This House is the same old shit jovi have been churning out...

He's not sorely missed in my eyes/ears in the song (or in general) and I don't mean that in a nasty way. Maybe it's because the band don't excite me as much as they used to and the fact that Bon Jovi has been getting more and more about Jon over the last 10 years anyway. Plus like some of you have said already, the guitar work on the last 6 albums has taken the backseat anyway so it makes no difference who's playing.

I only recently watched a live performance of "We Don't Run" on YouTube and it was a little weird not seeing Richie, but only a little. A lot of the time I was like "So what".

I did think that Phil X would actually spice things up musically now that he's officially in the band, but I guess not.

Sure but until the album drops he's still at the same level he was always at, just in a photo and the music video. We haven't heard anything he's recorded with the band yet.