13/08/2014 - Richie Sambora - Tokyo, Ex Theater Roppongi

As long as you've touched on the subject, has she done any original instrumentals? If Vai, Satriani, and Co. admire her so much, why haven't they encouraged her to do more "serious" composing? Even Richie has managed to kick out an instrumental!

She is more than just a flashy guitarist ... She is a brilliant guitarist ....

I have to disagree, her sound and feel are horrible. Very trebly and she definately can't sing and doesn't have any stage presence.

Shame that for someone who wanted so much to cut loose artistically from the confines of the Bon Jovi touring machine, that the setlists have now stagnated to being pretty similar to near identical every show.

He's a joke. I honestly don't know who the target is for these shows, who are they being catered to. I don't think either Richie fans or Bon Jovi fans or Guitarists or casuals (?) are being pleased by these shows.

They have nowhere near enough Richie songs rotation for Richie fans, nowhere near enough Bon Jovi songs (or even a good selection) for BJ fans, nowhere near enough variation for any die hard, sloppy guitar work all around for guitarists to even care and for casuals.. well.. Richie who?

It's weird to see so much hate towards Richie in this forum. It looks that majority of you think that he became s.h.i.t guitarist, lame performer and a joke overnight, or should I say since he left Bon Jovi. To tell you the truth, I think Richie’s live singing is much more enjoyable than any of Jon’s from WAN tour and Orianthi is much better guitarist than Bobby or the beloved Jon, so go figure.

I don't know, I enjoyed the shows and so did the people around me but there was a nagging thought of "this could be so much better". I think with less Aftermath songs, restricted self indulgent noodling with Orianthi and a bit of tightening up with his singing then Richie could have a good touring act. At the moment I'm not sure I'd go and see this setup live again and I'm not in the least bit interested in seeing Little Miss Moody hat head ever again. Drop her Rich.

It's a really negative thing for me to say but why do the two have to be compared since both are bad? They can both be lower quality than the used to be. My beef with Richie wasn't a case of "he left the band and I've been hating him since", I've noticed his playing getting worse since 2000, maybe not worse but sloppy and unimaginative. With each tour it felt like he lost something but when he was on he was ON. His actions during his 2012 solo tour flat out pissed me off.

Everyone involved with the band just needs to sit down, rest, talk to each other and refind why they started this in the first place INCLUDING "the beloved Jon".

I agree 100% with the above.

This is something I never quite got. Why can't something die? Even if it doesn't die, why can't something stay as a watered down, worse version of what it was? It is what it is, I don't think sitting down/resting/talking is gonna improve anything. They are not sick or incommunicated, they just lost voice, practice, passion, whatever.

I would LOVE to know the exact discussion between Jon and Richie about the songs/writing/live/etc. Maybe someday we'll know.