Joe Rogan floats Michael Jackson theory

Joe Rogan shared his theory about Michael Jackson’s music during a recent episode of his podcast, The Joe Rogan Experience, saying that the pop icon’s portrayal of romance in his music came from fantasy rather than lived experience.

Newsweek reached out to Rogan’s representative via email for comment on Thursday.

Why It Matters

Rogan, 58, one of the most influential American podcast hosts, used his popular platform to discuss the late pop icon. With millions of listeners, Rogan’s conversations often shape online discourse and public curiosity.

What To Know

“I got a theory,” Rogan said on Wednesday’s episode of The Joe Rogan Experience. “I think one of the reasons why [Michael Jackson’s] songs were so romantic—there was a romance to his songs when he was talking about love that was like, it was so attractive is because he never had it before.”

“It was a fantasy,” Rogan continued. “It was like being a normal person. Like that was the fantasy that was coming out in the songs.”

When his guest, political commentator Konstantin Kisin, asked if Jackson wrote his own songs, Rogan responded: “I don’t know, that’s a good question. But even the way he expressed those songs, I bet he wrote some of his songs.”

Jackson, who died in 2009 at the age of 50, wrote many of his own songs, including hits “Billie Jean” and “Beat It.” According to NME, the “King of Pop” spoke out about his writing process during his copyright infringement court case for “Dangerous” in 1994: “The lyrics, the strings, the chords, everything comes at the moment like a gift that is put right into your head and that’s how I hear it,” he said, per the outlet.

Jackson ultimately won the case when a federal jury ruled he did not steal the hit tune from up-and-coming singer Crystal Cartier, Variety reported at the time.

What People Are Saying

Rogan previously praised Jackson during a May 2019 episode of The Joe Rogan Experience with guest Wiz Khalifa: “Michael Jackson was the one when there was no one before. There was no real one like him. I mean, there was Elvis and that’s about it. There [were] other ones that were big, they were very popular, very famous, but Michael Jackson—he transcended so hard, I was listening to WBCN Radio in Boston—it’s a rock ‘n’ roll station—and they were like, ‘I know this is a rock ‘n’ roll station, but this song is so f****** good, we’re gonna play it anyway,’ and they played Michael Jackson. We were like, ‘Wow.'”