Jon Bon Jovi says he’s still heartbroken over Richie Sambora’s exit

Jon Bon Jovi says he remains heartbroken over Richie Sambora’s departure from Bon Jovi, more than a decade after the guitarist walked off in the middle of a world tour. Speaking on Bunnie Xo’s Dumb Blonde podcast on Monday, the frontman paid tribute to Sambora’s talent and his longtime role in the band, saying, “The great thing that I have said about him throughout our lives was you would be lucky to call him your friend, and I mean that — talented beyond, beyond as a guitar player, as a singer, as a collaborator, wonderful, right-hand man, awesome. Couldn’t ask for more.” Bon Jovi’s comments come as the band continues to navigate the headline-making split that reshaped its lineup for years to come.

Sambora left the group in the middle of the 2013 world tour to focus on co-parenting his daughter with ex-wife Heather Locklear following their 2007 divorce. The singer said he still felt the sting of that moment and laid out the complexity of the situation, noting that he wanted the truth to emerge. “My heartbreak with him is the way he walked out on us, compounded by the fact that it took him years to come back in the room just to have a meal with Tico and David and I and say, ‘I’m sorry,'” he explained. Bon Jovi also reflected on the idea that Sambora could have made his exit with more direct communication, adding, “If what he wanted was to be just Richie Sambora, not a member of Bon Jovi, do it right? I always encourage all of my guys, because my attitude was, ‘Bring the information back that you learn outside. It’ll only help us.'”

After Sambora left, he was replaced by Bon Jovi’s current guitarist, Phil X, as the band pressed on with tours and new material. In 2024, Sambora spoke out in the documentary Thank You, Goodnight: The Bon Jovi Story, offering a measured self-assessment of his departure. “I don’t regret leaving the situation, but I regret how I did it, so I want to apologize fully right now to the fans, especially, and also to the guys because my feet and my spirit were just not letting me walk out the door,” Sambora said in answering questions about the film. The documentary presents his perspective alongside the band’s history, including Bon Jovi’s insistence that there was never a fight that forced the guitarist to quit the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame group.

“There was substance abuse, there was anxiety, there was being a single parent, there was a lot of personal issues he was going through. But never to this day did any of us, me or him or David [Bryan] or Tico [Torres], ever have a fight,” Bon Jovi stated, adding that Sambora’s decision to step away stemmed from a desire to be home more than a commitment to on-the-road life. “There’s no animosity. An integral part of my story for three of the four chapters was my right-hand man, asked to join my band and I was lucky to have met him. But life went on.”

Whatever the public timeline, the personal history between Jon Bon Jovi and Richie Sambora remains a defining chapter in the band’s lore. Bon Jovi’s reflections on the 2013 exit, the 2024 reckoning, and the ongoing partnership with Phil X offer a window into how one of rock’s most enduring acts has chosen to tell its story to fans. For now, the frontman’s blunt candidness about heartbreak and responsibility underscores the enduring complexity of long-running bands and the human lives behind the music.