Yes he is. But over the years I have read many interviews that show (or imply) that Richie is a flake. Or if flake is the wrong word, perhaps not as serious about the band as the others were. There were interviews that he has shown up late for and Jon's comment was "That's our Richie".

Considering the possibility of the issue being between Richie and Jon, it's interesting to watch this interview from before the tour started. At 7:50 when giving advice for success, Jon seems sullen when he says have band members that you like and that he thinks he got that right.


But Richie's goofiness is part of his charm. With this current situation though, he is really shedding a poor light on himself with his stupid tweets. I keep waiting for him to apologize for letting fans down, but instead he tells us how great he's doing.

Been to any or are you judging them by a blurred wobbly camera view on YouTube?

Yes. Thought so.

I would turn gay for Richie Sambora, I honestly think the guy is amazing and would blindly defend anything he does. I also don't like Jon much, given his ego, his CEO stuff, the "me" instead of "the band" stuff etc, but even I'm now starting to get p*ssed off with Richie.

I agree his tweets are not coming over in a good light at the moment, at first I was happy to hear from him and that he seemed well, but lately I'm coming round to the notion that they're a bit of a two fingers to everyone.

Yes it's apparently a personal issue, but surely he must know how long he is going to be out for. At least give some sort of clue. And if he has chucked it, which it more and more starts to seem like, just come out and say it.

I now agree Richie needs to speak. And I'm actually starting to feel a bit of sympathy for Jon *gulp*. That p*sses me off even more. :p

Before I get accused of reading too much into things, lets look at facts...

Richie is tweeting rather infrequently. One of the rumours I've heard in the last two days is that he needs some sort of procedure to correct something that makes it impossible for him to play guitar. This rumour has come from an ex-colleague and apparently it's doing the rounds.

I hear that a couple of days back and now a tweet about how Rockbridge guitars are killer... totally set off alarm bells in my head.

It's not impossible that Richie has heard this, seeing as it's something the press are discussing 'privately'. This tweet kind of cuts that rumour dead. It's like every time Jon speaks to the press about it, Richie creates his own 'press release' through Twitter. It seems a little like these guys are playing chess at the moment.

If this is the case and I am running out of any other ideas - I wish they'd just f*cking speak to each other and stop behaving like five year-olds.

The other fact that backs this up is, no one seems to know when he will be back, which lends itself to the possibility that this was all on a whim because he demanded to play some solo songs or he wanted a night off for this or that. I think this is definitely linked to Richie's solo album and the timing of What About Now & the tour.

OR... maybe the rumour I heard is true and Richie's just working out the geeetar muscles ready for IOW...

I think 2014 should be the Bon Jovi - Because We're Sorry tour. They need to do shows at every single city that Richie's missed, both on this tour and in 2011.

"We don't wanna give another sub-standard concert
We wanna rock, not just bore the crowd to tears
Wanna make sure Richie gets his ass back on the tour bus
We ain't a failure but we're here to make it up
Because We're Sorry"

Jon does shows with the king of suburbian. Richie has the right to do the same with his solo band.

I agree but it's not me Richie has 'personal issues' with.

We do not know.

Best post ever.

It's actually the sum of the entire 366-page thread so far. Pretty enlightening, huh?

Absolutely... It says it all... Rolo is an artist.

This is the worst tour of Bon Jovi. That think about it?

Ok so if Richie is really back from june 6th.... Assbutts, my show is on may 24th and now Im booked up with work and cant travel abroad before August- all because they wouldnt say flip all so I said I could work all july. Therefor its now too late for me to change my mind re the HP show. THANKS :@@@ 1,5 week after my show .. I AM SO PISSED.

Perhaps that is the reason for silence jon in the interview.

And yes I know its still just a rumour but I wouldnt be surprised if its true.

I know how much of a piss take it would be, but he has got to come back at some point and whenever that is there will be pissed off fans

Makes sense June 6th as its the start of the big shows - no offence to those who dont see IOW, Hyde Park and the UK as big shows...

If they didn't think UK has massive fan base they would do one show each tour here not 5+ each tour

There could be foundations to this as to why the UK refunds were pulled so abruptly.

And for me Madrid show too.. It was a surprise to spanish fans, it's sold out and last time they played this stadium was in '96

This whole thing is effin' surreal. We've got our hopes up over some rumor that has Obie carefreely spreading rainbows and unicorns around, while in the very meantime Jon makes the gloomiest statement about it or even ever, in general.
All of this while, as Rolo so well put it, we just don't know anything at all.

You mean they're not offering refunds for UK shows any longer? What's the official excuse about it?

They did at first and then a few days later they were apparently told not to. Maybe this could be why if they have an inkling he may be back for the UK shows onwards.

Yeah, it could be, but I wonder how they're justifying this in the meantime. People from other countries succeeded in getting their refunds.

Love it! Thank you for a laugh!:D

Hunting back a few pages, it was a few days after the refunds option was posted:

IF, and its a big IF, its true that Richie may be back from 6/6 onwards, maybe they only found that out after posting the info on bj.com and tried to frantically backtrack. They can easily just say that the show goes ahead and there are no refunds, they are well used to that! I wonder if anyone has got a refund from a non-uk show after June 6th though.

¨

I haven't seen any sign on refunds being offered for Stockholm either though, and that's before 6/6...

My friend and I did.
We bought tickets for Bern (June 30th), because at the time of sale DC tickets for Milan were impossible to get (both FC and standard). We still don't know what happened. Anyway, not even 10 minutes before the announcement about Richie being MIA in Europe was made, tickets for Milan went on sale on Backstage again, and so my friend was able to grab a couple of those this time around (I haven't been a member in years). At first, we thought we would have to find a way to sell tickets for Bern somehow, but then the refund option was given and we used that. I know, maybe not the best thing to do, but hey. It was pretty impossible to sell European tickets after the announcement anyway, not to mention my friend actually had a FC one for herself and, well, good luck selling those.

About UK refunds, yeah, I remember reading about that. But then nobody said anything anymore, it kinda got lost in this big turmoil! I wonder how UK fans dealt with that.

That post was made on 7th May, so maybe that's about the point when the refunds stopped.

Its interesting and gives us something else to ponder in the will he/won't he saga. I'm tired of how its all gone down and will be happy enough to see Phil X, Richie just rolling back up, playing well as if nothing has happened would no doubt leave a sour taste for many.

By the way... What about refunds for UK fan club tickets? Were they pulled as well?

Only going by what I read here, I don't recall any info about fan club refunds other than people e mailing Sparkart.

Yeah, me too. And, if I recall correctly, there were no complains about Sparkart not giving refunds.
I think if a fan asked for a refund for a show because of Richie's absence, got it and then found out Richie's actually gonna be there and they're left with no ticket, well, said fan would probably not be a happy camper.
I'm not sure I can see this happening. Jon's words don't help either. Of course, the brain says one thing, the heart goes the opposite direction, no matter what.

To be honest, I'd be quite happy in that respect, if I'd got a refund I'd probably be able to get a cheaper ticket closer to the time so would still end up going but saving money! Although for me personally, my tickets were dirt cheap anyway except for Hyde Park so I don't need to be cute, but if I had paid £70+ for an unreserved ticket I would definitely have been trying to refund with a view to re-purchasing at a lower price, but that's my bookie side coming through!

Wouldn't you risk to end up without a ticket though?
Also, we know shows have fans from all over the world, that's what makes me think of this a little bit of as sci-fi. Say I had a ticket for a UK show, for example. Booked hotel, travel, what have you. Shit hits the fan with the announcement about Richie. I ask for a refund and eventually get it after breaking a sweat or two. Cancel my hotel and travel reservations (if I can, or lose money otherwise). Then, poof, out of the blue Richie is back and I'm with no ticket, no hotel, no travel arrangements. Imagine the shitstorm that would happen. People complaining and the band's reputation going down the sink. (Of course it was all hypothetical. I would and will still go to see Bon Jovi, with or without Richie).

Nah, the stadium shows in the UK aren't selling out. You may not get the type of ticket you want but you would easily get a ticket of some kind. If there was travel arrangements involved then indeed its a go or no go choice and you'd be sick if you cancel plans, lose some deposits and then Richie shows up after all. It's why the lack of information is frustrating as people can't make an informed choice with partial info.

That's right. And that's where I think we have reached the focus point of the whole thing. There's this huge, dark gap between the official word and the not-so-official one.

Officially, all we know is Richie's having personal matters he needs to deal with and he will be gone for all of the European shows.
A few miles of blurred confusion after that, we have idiotic rumors only stupid people believe, somewhat "reliable" rumors, interviews and statements from the very people involved, and desperate attempts at psychology by reading Jon and/or Richie's body language, pictures, 3-second videos, usage of words and pronunciation of vowels.

It's like we know, but we don't. An official announcement has been made about Richie not being in Europe, yet we're not sure we can trust it or if that condition - whatever that is - might change sooner or later. And deep inside we all know this goes way beyond just touring, but we're hardly able to admit it out loud.

new advertising vid for UK....notice it says 'Jon and the band' with images of Tico, Dave and Richie


edit: never mid just saw publish date

TICNET denies me the refund, you can see the answer that gives me in his oficial Facebook page.

I am from Madrid,and I will go only here, so I have sold 2DC for Stockholm in viagogo...
I have loose much money because is very difficult now to sell the tickets.

If- IF- Richie did come back 06/06, I wonder what would happen to Phil X?

Would he stay with the tour, almost an understudy in case Richie goes again?