When I first heard Bounce, I decided (with all the "careful consideration" that only a 16 year old is capable of
) that it was my favourite Bon Jovi album ever. Needless to say this changed very quickly, and now it is in my bottom 3 of the bands albums. As others have said, its not a bad album as such, it's just terribly disjointed - it feels like the band set out to make about four different albums (especially if you take the b-sides into consideration - with songs like We Can Dance and Breathe, there's a whole other acousticy/rootsy/folky subsection that never even made the album) and mashed it together into one album. Not that there's necessarily anything wrong with musical diversity on one album, but I think the fact that they sort of tried to market it as a semi concept album about 9/11 just confused people, and drew unfavourable comparisons to Bruce Springsteen's The Rising album.
There is about half of a good album in there though. The heavy songs generally work (although the production on them is far from the best - attempting to be simultaneously heavier and more poppy than ever was always going to be difficult), the love ballads less so (I do kind of have a soft spot for AALY though), and the epic ballads are a decent attempt at something different, although falling a little short of greatness. It also as an album seemed to take itself a little too seriously - with the exception of Misunderstood (which sounds totally out of place), the sense of fun and playfulness that was good about Crush had almost totally disappeared - instead our band seemed to be coldly trying to emulate just about everyone else - Metallica, Creed, Springsteen, Elton John, Eric Clapton - and forgot to just be Bon Jovi. To conclude then, Bounce is definitely an interesting album - but not always for the right reasons.
14. Undivided (I'm so glad I didn't listen when this was leaked and heard it for the first time live at Wembley Arena instead)
13. The Distance
12. Right Side Of Wrong
11. Hook Me Up
10. Everyday
9. Bounce
8. Love Me Back To Life
7. Joey
6. All About Lovin' You
5. Misunderstood
4. No Regrets
3. Postcards From The Wasteland
2. Open All Night (one of very few songs I actually like less after hearing it live)
1. You Had Me From Hello (probably the wimpiest Bon Jovi ballad ever)