JRE MMA Show #91 with Radio Rahim

Radio Rahim (0:00)

Doo, doo, doo.

Joe Rogan (0:02)

Yeah, that is a guy named Ross Baines. He painted that. He's also painted this, there's a picture in the green room of me and Daniel Cormier, and there's another one.

He said, I think he sent me the one of Mazvadal. He did an amazing one of Jorge Mazvadal when he landed this knee on Ben Askren. He's a great artist, but that's Richard Pryor. He painted that for me.

Radio Rahim (0:21)

Well, clearly, my screensaver used to be a collection of mug shots, like Jim Morrison. I have Morrison out there.

Joe Rogan (0:29)

Yeah, I have Frank Sinatra in the green room.

Radio Rahim (0:31)

Okay, so the thing is, I'm not a criminal, right? I don't aspire to be a criminal.

But what are these, like these mug shots are so iconic, what does it mean to you to see your heroes essentially charged with crimes and maybe one of the worst nights there are a lot?

Joe Rogan (0:47)

Well, it didn't start off that way. This is what happened. I was in Hawaii, and I'm a giant Jimi Hendrix fan. That's why I named the podcast Joe Rogan Experience.

I ripped off the Jimi Hendrix Experience. And I was in Hawaii, and I went to this art gallery, and they had all this rock and roll art, and they had this really dope collaboration of Hendrix.

His mugshot was like six, nine, nine images, nine square images of a Hendrix mugshot. I go, that looks cool as fuck. And so I bought it. And I also bought the Rosa Parks one, and I also bought the Elvis one. They had three different, like just nine squares on one piece of artwork. And I thought it looked cool. So I said, oh, that'd be a good backdrop for the podcast. So the old podcast studio, I had those behind me.

And then I started picking up other ones. Like I got Janis Joplin in the bathroom. I got Johnny Cash. I got James Brown. I got Pryor on the wall here. I got Jim Morrison. I got Steven Tyler on the wall over there. I just started collecting them. And there's no real rhyme or reason to it. I just, I got Lenny Bruce.

I got everybody, but I just found mug shots and I just started collecting them.

Radio Rahim (2:02)

I had, like I said, my screen server was that for like a year. And I even had Sinatra in my room.

Big, you know, a big one on the wall and whatnot. And I'm like, you know, what is this shit about?

But it occurred to me, like everybody that became an icon, became a legend, like you have to break the rules. There's nobody who just like followed every rule and that's what they're famous for. Like, hey, this guy never stepped out of line, did everything that everyone said he was supposed to do, did it all the ways that you're within the rules, and that's the fucking legend that you love. No, it's almost like it's illegal to be exceptional. You have to fucking break the law to make the imprint on the society that you want to make.

Joe Rogan (2:42)

Well, particularly in the time where these guys were doing their art, I mean, we're talking about Morrison and Hendricks, this is the 70s, the 60s. See, it was wild times, there's this transitionary period between the 50s where everything was like mom and pop and diners and fucking drive-through movies and shit, and then all, or drive-in movies, and then all of a sudden you have drugs and wild rock and roll and James Brown and chaos and, you know, Hendricks was guitar.

Radio Rahim (3:09)

Right, but whatever you're not supposed to do, that's the thing you should be doing. I mean, within reason, we're not talking about harming other people or whatnot, but the society is like restrictions, that's the boundary to keep you as a normal person, as a, like...

Joe Rogan (3:23)

I wish I had a better answer.

But if I had to really put my finger on it, I would say that those images represent these moments where society tried to contain these wild people. Exactly. These people that were breaking the rules, these people that were trying to change culture, these people that were just doing their thing. And it wasn't like they weren't popular.

I mean, I think Jim Morrison pulled his dick out, right? Didn't he pull his dick out? I mean, he was insanely popular when he pulled his dick out. And they're like, enough!

Radio Rahim (3:51)

That way he was insanely popular when he got arrested finally for pulling his dick out. But when you get arrested for pulling your dick out, it's never the first time.