I appreciate that Yngwie is a marmite guitarist, especially for non-guitar players. He is supremely talented and I think people forget how influential he was, but I admit his playing can often be self indulgent. Although I was recently watching some of his live shows with Alcatraz and he was off the charts good.

Back to Richie, while I am sure there are times he has been intoxicated publically over the last decade, I do not think it explains his decline. His voice hasn't gone, it is his playing while his general demeanor can sometimes seem off. Let's not forget he probably played plenty of times smashed over the years and did a good job.

Is he now just sloppy and not putting in the hard work, the equivalent of not looking after your voice? Maybe, but I think he said in one interview he plays guitar more than ever and does practice. Perhaps he just does not do well as a frontman. He often looks uncomfortable and out of his element. For all his talk of being a frontman in his older bands, he was not one for thirty years. It does require some skill to capture the audience beyond your quality as a musician.

Good post.

So many bands/rockstars have the excess so well documented publicly, Bon Jovi less so. The washing was done more or less in-house, it was their "omertà ". But just because it's less documented doesn't mean it wasn't dirty.

I know the partying in the 80s has been alluded to but it didn't stop there ( for Richie )

The 90s he was on fire in terms of his playing whilst a functioning addict - booze mainly but there was the other stuff too.

He's said it himself he's been on a stag do that lasted 30 years.

The body ( and mind) keep scores, there's no escaping it.

I wish the guy well, I fear it's too late for him. En plus , if anyone here is struggling , fire me a message . Addiction is a dreadful illness but there is a way out so long as you ask for help

Peace y'all

seen all the available clips from the show...Richie obvilously doesnt look good..I cant tell what is the reason behind it but sth is really wrong..
he cant perform a single song right.. too sloppy which shows he simply doesnt play anymore, no matter what he says...he was a brilliant musician, there are some glimpses here and there but cant perform a single song in a decent way...
what made worried was how thin he looked, i ve never seen him so thin, and for a guy with a series of addictions my fear is he upscaled...
hope i m wrong.
The new songs sound good but Richie was so unprepared...the guitar malnfunction...some songs are half a step lower, i think this was the problem, i ve never seen Richie playing so out of tune before...(there was a show with Bonamassa but different reasons), he couldnt remember the chords of his songs in the new numbers.
if he puts the effort he will get better unless there are other issues.
and sth last, what was really weird was when he left the stage and he had o be encouraged to continue..

Weight loss is tricky to go on. He was a bit huskier in the BJTV's for the recording of Bounce, lost it in time for the Everyday video. Look how thin he got for the Aftermath era. I'm hoping the weight loss isn't tied to anything health related but we also don't know what he's been doing to prep for the release, minus recording 300 songs and delaying it continuously.

When I met him In 2014 his legs were stick thin. Like my uncle , who's liver had packed in. It was scary, skin tight jeans hanging off him

12 months ago he was a little chubby though...he's been up and down with his weight for years. It does seem as though he sheds some weight when hes about to start a tour or album cycle and then adds it when he's not doing much. I think he looks better with the weight off. If you look at the photos from the Ivor Awards this week I think he looks pretty well compared to when he's a bit bloated.

This is interesting, I could classify 2014 as one of his chubbier years. I guess as you get older your body starts doing weird things. Looking forward to it...

He did put on a lot of weight compared to 2013. But I have to agree that his legs looked strange when he wore the red trousers during the concerts

Yeah visceral fat ( a man gets a beer gut ) is fat round the organs , as a booze bag and a man in his mid 50s he of course had a gut with bingo wings but the legs being rake thin is a tell tell sign the liver isn't doing what it should.

Ah, I like Living Alone, I can't wait to hear this one on the album.

Seeing a clip of maybe a pre award show interview from that day and Richie is engaging and his usual funny self even though he's pretty much mouthing the generic "if you can help people through your songs.." bs, which I guess every artist has to. I don't buy that he's drunk out of his mind. I just wish that he puts in way more effort to the technical aspect of music. Maybe sit down with an acoustic and build an unshakeable setlist where he doesn't have to fiddle with the EQ, pedals, guitàrs, microphone, lyrics etc. Just give people a tight show! After a point it doesn't matter who you used to be, just who you are currently. Remember when he sort of rehearsed with that violin gal and put together a totally serviceable version of Taking a Chance with the Wind in studio. Value your own songs!
I agree with Rolo, can't wait for the album. We do tend to overanalyse but that stems from the fact that we have been devoid of anything worthy for far too long.

why aren't there any more videos?
he played 3 or 4 new songs and before the show they previewed the fans 4 new ones

He played 4 new ones: Feelin' Alright, Songs That Wrote My Life, Livin' Alone and We'll Get By (twice). The whole things has been filmed to the best of my knowledge.

Feelin' Alright? maybe Joe Cocker cover?

25 years ago when I thought about the future, I didn't expect Jon to morph into this old wannabe business man and I didn't expect to see Richie want to become Peter Pan.

I occasionally check in to see how guys like Brett Michael and Joe Elliot are doing and they became exactly what I expected them to become in there mid to upper 50s.

Richie however still thinks he looks good in 80s glam and Jon thinks he's 80 years old. Their music lost all depth and passion. Richie still has some voice left but has no idea on how to be a front-man. Jon on the other hand still has some front-man left in him but has no voice to bring it together.

I don't know what Richie's deal is. Is he drunk or stoned, burnt out, or just old and immature... but he is definitely not the guy I expected him to be at this age. I just don't see him as an artist anymore and I don't think Jon does either. He's past the point of ever returning back to the band and I really think Jon has come to peace with it because he knows Richie is in trouble.





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This seems to confirm my suspicions.

Richie Sambora Bush Hall - Feelin' Alright (Joe Cocker Cover) clip
https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=1563787467295989



Joe Cocker - Feelin' Alright




.

Richie Sambora - Live at Bush Hall (London 2021)

That watermark couldn't be bigger, you gotta squint to look through it :rolleyes:

The Joe Cocker cover is miiiiiiiiiiiiiiiles better than everything else from the show. This is where he's at his strongest.

and didn't realize he did Stranger acapella. That's a....choice alright.

He's even worse than Jon. 😥

Yeah looked a great show eh ?

Dear Jesus !?!! Guys a train wreck

Nope, he’s far from his prime, but he still has a voice, can play guitar and have a good time 😎

Richie: https://youtu.be/mhVjFxiAIwQ

His voice in actually in better shape than his guitar playing. I think having another guitar player in his band he can share lead with wouldn't be the worst idea (not Ori lol). Him being the sole guitar player, front man, singer, etc is too much for him.

Just the two minute snippet of All That Really Matters with just him and his acoustic showed what good condition is voice is still in.

I think what he needs is a musical director. When Ebbins was co-running the show the shows felt well more put together and flowed a bit more. Richie was still giving the band stage directions but at least then when something went wrong it wasn't on Richie to fix it. In this era when something goes wrong Richie is left singing without a guitar while he motions to the drummer to go slower and asking for more bass all at the same time.

Jon lacks musical inspiration and Richie musical direction. That's why the two we're still functioning much better together even 10 years ago and fell off a wagon ever since :mrgreen:

Richie wants to live in the past and Jon wants to forget the past... That pretty much sums up their musical separation.

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Spot on! Agree completely.

As much as I dog on the guy and the state of his live performance, I'm truly looking forward to this album. "Pain where there once was a heart has been" on my bucket list since seeing the title for years and it feels pure Richie.

That song promises. Living Alone has grown on me, and it's just a live performance debut where Richie was kind of rusty. So I can't wait to hear this one on the album as well.

I've just came across this interview on youtube...

What a great one! Richie is cheerful, outgoing, making jokes...but answering questions coherently, really in a very good shape. I miss those days.

https://youtu.be/mhVjFxiAIwQ

He doesn’t look or sound well in this clip��

I suddenly started wondering about the scale of things as they are. A thing that I came up with was to check up on the monthly listeners in Spotify: Bon Jovi 18,7 millions, Richie Sambora 137k and an obscure Finnish band from the 80's 20k (I am from Finland).

Obviously Richie has a huge part on the Bon Jovi listeners and this is just one of many ways to look at it. But still, I found it a bit stopping that basically as a solo artist, Richie is a nonentity. Orianthi has 300k and nobody cares about her.

I think Richie’s lack of Spotify listeners isn’t (just?) a lack of popularity. His solo discography isn’t overly big and he hasn’t released a solo album in nearly a decade.

I don’t know how many listeners Orianthi had last year, but she released a new album last year, so it would make sense if she gained some listeners because of that. (She’s also quite active on social media which gives her more exposure, especially amongst the people who are actually Spotify users.)

Bon Jovi also gained 2 million listeners since last fall (I know because I checked their monthly listeners to do some calculations when my Spotify Wrapped 2020 told me that I was amongst the top 0.001% Bon Jovi listeners that year [emoji23]).

Additionally a significant portion of Richie’s fanbase probably doesn’t even use Spotify, so you’ve got a lot of people who just bought his music on iTunes or don’t listen to it digitally at all but rather on CD.

It’s gonna be interesting to see how his monthly listeners will change when he finally releases new material.


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He looks and sounds absolutely fine in this clip. Sure he's lost some weight and when you lose weight as you get older it does age people. Remember the guy is 62! :rolleyes:

Spot on - last time he released an album I doubt much more than 5% of his fan base would have been using spotify. I know I wasn't. Rock fans were/are one of the last to move to digital & streaming. The numbers are dissapinting, true, but I think we need to judge it after he has released a new album. You will get a true reading after that.

It's a tough thing to compare Richie and Ori streaming wise. Richie has had buckets of hits but none under his own name, Ori's had a hit under her own name and has a younger fanbase more likely so stream. At this point neither of them are THAT well known.

I don't think it's about sales at this point. I think it's just for the fun of making and releasing new music and playing some shows.

Despite Richie having a small fan base, they still shows minimal interest in his new music, and his shows still sell out, at least in Europe.

I think that's the key. I don't think Richie is thinking about the billboard or things like that. Thinking of Joe Perry for example.

Today, anyone can release their own music on iTunes and release a limited run of their albums in physical format.

You just have to wait for the right moment, and I think it's closer.

Joe Perry is a good comparison. He's the same sort of "celebrity" guitarist from a big rock band, with a fan base of a similar age. Although his solo stuff is nowhere near the quality of Richie's. On Spotify he has almost 54,000 monthly listeners compared to Richie's 137,000.

All very valid points. Another one probably is Richie's lack of solo releases. Even in fan circles (I mean regular ones, not the three or four crazy diehard users here :mrgreen: ), he's more and more regarded as a has-been.
If some random music fan who might've liked Bon Jovi and Richie's solo stuff looks into it, they realize it's been 8.5 years since he left Bon Jovi 'cause he needed that artistic freedom and yet hasn't released a solo record ever since. It's been quite some time by now. If it was a band I had randomly followed from time to time, I'd also be lead to believe that he simply isn't into making music anymore.