If we're talking "noticeable" as far as drinking goes I will never forget him slurring "Words can't say what love me do" in Montreal summer of 2006. But that could have also been a mix of the painkillers too.

But like everyone is saying if he's been drinking since the 80's something would have changed, he was competent and pretty eloquent in interviews until the last decade or so. I just don't think it's booze and booze alone.

Didn't Steven Tyler fall off the wagon when he was on painkilling medication a couple years back, too? Hell, Tom Petty DIED from a painkiller overdose. It's not like that stuff is easy to shake or harmless. (Plus, coupled with booze, side effects ensue)

True enough!

To get back on topic, according to ASCAP Jon and Shanks wrote both of the two new songs.

Yes, but that happened in 2009, not a couple years back.

He's been going strong ever since.

The effects of poor habits are cumulative (drinking, abuse of illegal or legal drugs, smoking, eating unhealthy foods, sun exposure, bad posture... whatever it is, the longer you do it, the more side effects you see).

Nah. That was just his Dean Martin persona colliding with his Beatles influences. :D


Well, that could be explained by the snowball effect that addictions can have over the years, where things get steadily worse. But that’s another easy jump to make. I agree that if the explanation was that simple, we would probably have seen a more consistent downward spiral since 2005-ish; and that hasn’t been the case. He was obviously struggling during HAND and LH; then seemed ok for a while; but suddenly went into rehab in April 2011. Then from the time he returned in June, he seemed back on his game for the rest of the GH tour and while he was writing and recording AOTL, including those performances. Even throughout the first leg of the BWC tour he seemed fine and, according to some people, actually carried those shows. Unless you consider the occasional “lip-licking” that some people assumed was coke-related, there was no real appearance of substance abuse through the rest of 2013 and most of 2014, iirc. Then his performances and behavior in interviews became more erratic again during late 2016 and 2017.

So, instead of a steady decline, there’s been an up/down or on/off pattern. The timing of the “off” behaviors seems to parallel major upheavals in his personal and professional lives, which leads me to believe there are mitigating circumstances, or it's something else that we don't know about. People have suggested things like illness, anti-depressants, or a lack of confidence coupled with over-compensation.

That’s not to say that his addictions haven’t played a part, especially with the painkiller component. Richie wrote, “…you cure your problems with a bottle of instant forget” but I know too many people who started out taking painkillers for physical pain, then found that it helped them “forget” a lot of emotional pain as well. Maybe the “personal demons” that Jon and David keep referring to aren’t Richie’s addictions, per se, but whatever it is that he may be trying to bury under them.

Strange, that.

I was confused enough about why, after people had waited so long for RSO’s new music, all they wanted to talk about on the “Richie (new music)” thread seemed to be Richie’s shortcomings. But it’s REALLY confusing to see that that’s taken over the BJ “new music” thread, too. And even more confusing is that most of the time it’s not the Richie apologists who bring him up. I don't know if it's Richie’s flaws or Jon’s voice that gets the most discussion. One thing for dead sure, it’s clearly not the band or the music. Richie may not be an official band member any longer, but it’s hard to deny that we're still living with a ghost. ;)


Anyway... to follow you back on topic: it’s not surprising that Jon and Shanks wrote both of the two new songs, since they’ve been joined at the hip for the last decade or so. But if poor David couldn’t get a word in edgewise with Jon and "Mookie" in the studio, as Jon said, what’s surprising to me is that he can manage it now, with the Jon and “Snooky” show.

Given that Billy Falcon has co-written quite a bit of music lately, I don't see why any new track should be assumed to be a JBJ/JS composition by default.

Yeah, it's an over-glorification to say it's always always always Shanks as the co-writer. It's been Shanks, Falcon and a handful of one off writers dating back to Lost Highway, as well as writing alone, Jon has been using.

Tomorrow show?
https://dfa7z742m6igx.cloudfront.net...g?v=1518711583