COVID-19 is the cause of the delays
Bon Jovi has delayed its upcoming Bon Jovi 2020 album with the tour “at least postponed” due to the COVID-19 outbreak. The rock star appeared on The Howard Stern Show and Maria Shriver’s Home Together podcast over the past week to discuss the upcoming Jersey 4 Jersey benefit concert he appears with Bruce Springsteen, Halsey and others, as well as album and tour news.
“I wrote a new song because of this pandemic that I’m gonna add to the record now that that’s delayed, and it’s called ‘Do What You Can,'” Bon Jovi tells Stern on Wednesday (April 15th). “I wrote a song about the situation that we’re in so I’m gonna perform that in its entirety for the first time ever.”
The album was scheduled for May 15th via Island Records, but no new release date has been revealed as of press time.
No word if Bon Jovi will use a fan submitted second verse for “Do What You Can” that he promoted last month on social media. JBJ has been recording submissions and sharing them on his socials.
The Bon Jovi 2020 Tour was scheduled to kick off June 10th in Tacoma, WA with Bryan Adams supporting. The sold out trek had even added two extra dates to meet fan demand, but now is “at least postponed” as JBJ tells Maria Shriver last week.
“We’re always on a treadmill. It seems like we’re always running to the next thing. In my case, I had a record coming out next month and a tour sold out and ready to go, and rehearsals booked and stages to build, and on a dime it was gone. And it’s fine. It’s actually fine because it’s giving me time to reconnect,” he tells Shriver of his monthlong stay with his family at their New Jersey mansion.
He later says, “It’s hard, it’s hard for everybody because, you know, it starts at the top, right. If there’s no income for each one of those crew guys, it’s because there’s no income at the top either. Right now we’re still mulling over options whether we’re gonna postpone, or cancel, or by some miracle, this for all to clear up on Easter Sunday. Right now, although I’m confident that it’s at least postponed, a final decision has yet to be made. And at that time if in fact it has to be postponed, then you’re able to take care of some people. If it’s canceled, we’ll have to figure out what I can do to help until I decide we can go back to work again.”
Last month, keyboardist David Bryan revealed his coronavirus diagnosis. It took him over a month to fully recover as the rocker shared on his socials on Wednesday.
“Today is one month and 3 days of Corona!” he writes. “Finally feeling great again. Thanks for all your well wishes and especially thanks to all the doctors, nurses, first responders, grocery workers and all on the front lines! The true rock stars!”
More details as they become available.
