Originally Posted by Beaky

Sorry mate, I don't think I am alone in expecting a lot more from both parties than simply, ‘ask him.’ I wouldn’t accept that from Richie and it’s a cop-out from Jon too – and let’s face it, that statement is from Jon, not ‘the band’. The rest of them just fall in line with their boss, as you would.

So Jon saying ‘ask Richie’ and ‘he will be the guitarist ‘til he says he’s not’ is either spot on – because Richie is being a twat – or extremely sly and savvy because Richie feels Jon has made his position untenable. The point, which you and everyone seems to forget is, we don’t know what’s happened and just because Jon speaks to a journalist from a tabloid in a room at The Dorchester, doesn’t make his statements any more truthful than Richie speaking to his publicist and that publicist taking that story to a tabloid site. Both are using the avenues available to them.

Don’t forget, Jon made the same statement about Alec always being the only official Bon Jovi bass player and that was a pretty hollow statement considering he was a drunk who got fired. Jon knows how to play games with the press and put the pressure on Richie and who knows, maybe RS deserves it.

I’ll just reserve judgement until one of them comes out with the truth. But this affects the band and the fans, so I think we’re owed a statement FROM the band.