Jon Bon Jovi is officially ready for his comeback, announcing a return to the stage for a global tour in 2026. This confirmation comes after a devastating, decade-long vocal struggle that culminated in career-threatening surgery in 2022 and a grueling recovery that has only now given him the strength to perform.
Speaking with the How To Fail With Elizabeth Day podcast, the Bon Jovi frontman explained that his confidence has finally returned.
“But I’m confident enough now to know that I can sell a ticket,” Jon stated. “I wasn’t at all willing a year ago.”
That confidence was hard-won. Jon pinpointed the 2022 tour as his lowest point. He recalled finishing a 15-show run in Nashville, believing he had pulled it off, only to be met with a brutal assessment from his wife, Dorothea.
“I remember going into that dressing room in Nashville, Tennessee and saying to my wife, ‘It was pretty good.’ And she looked at me and she said, ‘It wasn’t,'” Jon recounted. “People think, ‘Oh, what a blow.’ It really wasn’t, because she’s gonna tell me the truth… I remember thinking to myself, ‘Well, time for a drink. I don’t think I could do this anymore. I don’t know why, but I’m okay with walking away from this because there’s no way I’m dragging down the legacy.'”
That moment, he said, “began my journey” to recovery. Jon sought out a surgeon who delivered a stark diagnosis: “one of my vocal cords had literally atrophied — it was dying.”
The singer underwent an implant surgery in 2022, where a scar is still visible at the base of his throat. “They put two pieces of Gore-Tex… outside of the vocal cords… that close the muscles together,” he explained. The doctor “promised me nothing other than I would be better than I was that night in Nashville.”
Jon then began what he describes as a “three-and-a-half-year recovery” that was far slower and more arduous than he could have imagined. The real challenge, he said, was not the surgery itself, but unlearning years of bad habits.
“I had basically seven or eight years of compensation to unwind,” Jon revealed. “So they had to start from scratch, teaching me how to speak, then how to ultimately make sound that sounded like singing and to get better and better throughout this process. And it’s a constant evolution.”
The Bon Jovi frontman traced the origin of the problem back to 2013 and 2014, a “tumultuous time” following the abrupt departure of guitarist Richie Sambora and business troubles.
“In 2014 the body crashed out from under me, and I wasn’t even aware,” he said. “But I know that when I walked by my guitar, not only didn’t I touch it, but I gave it the middle finger… by 2015… something just wasn’t right.” He pushed through the This House Is Not For Sale (2016) tour and the 2020 album, but his voice was failing.
Now, with his voice rebuilt, Bon Jovi is launching a 2026 world tour, set to begin with a residency at New York’s famed Madison Square Garden in July before heading to stadiums in London, Dublin, and Edinburgh.
Bon Jovi – “Forever Tour” 2026 Dates:
- July 07 – New York, NY – Madison Square Garden
- July 09 – New York, NY – Madison Square Garden
- July 12 – New York, NY – Madison Square Garden
- July 14 – New York, NY – Madison Square Garden
- August 28 – Edinburgh, UK – Scottish Gas Murrayfield Stadium
- August 30 – Dublin, Ireland – Croke Park
- September 04 – London, UK – Wembley Stadium
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