Jann Wenner — Co-founder and longtime editor/publisher of Rolling Stone magazine, central figure of 1960s-70s counterculture journalism and author of the memoir Like a Rolling Stone.
The gist
Jann Wenner recounts founding Rolling Stone in San Francisco in 1967 and how the magazine became the voice of a rebellious, psychedelic generation that mainstream media ignored. He shares deep, affectionate stories about his closest collaborator Hunter S. Thompson, from the freak-power Aspen sheriff campaign to writing Fear and Loathing in his basement, and the corrosive effects of fame and cocaine on Thompson, Belushi, and others. Wenner distinguishes psychedelics and marijuana, which he champions, from speed and cocaine, which he denounces as wasted time. The conversation turns political, with Wenner forcefully defending Democrats, climate action, wealth redistribution, and internet regulation against Rogan's pushback. He closes with vivid accounts of interviewing John Lennon, the elusive Michael Jackson, Bruce Springsteen, Al Gore, and Obama, exploring how fame traps people behind masks.
Big reveals
- Wenner tried to get Hunter Thompson into rehab and offered to pay for it, but Thompson refused, saying if he didn't take drugs he'd 'probably have been an accountant.'
- Plan Colombia allocated $700M to the drug war, but $620M went to a Connecticut defense contractor to build helicopters rather than alternate-crop programs.
- Michael Jackson insisted on interviewing Wenner first to vet him, requested the interview be done in the dark by candlelight, then canceled out of fear.
- Rogan and Wenner discuss the theory that Michael Jackson was chemically castrated by his father as a child to preserve his high voice.
- Wenner conducted John Lennon's first long interview after the Beatles broke up, describing Lennon as full of pain and desperate to expose the truth about fame.
- David Cassidy deliberately posed semi-nude on the Rolling Stone cover to break his Partridge Family contract; sponsors deserted and ABC pulled him off the air.
- In an exit interview the day after Trump's 2016 win, Obama refused to despair, telling Wenner this 'is not a tragedy, my mother died of cancer, that's a tragedy.'
- After losing, Al Gore privately told Wenner over lunch, 'I just don't have the appetite to lie anymore.'
Things worth remembering
- Wenner started Rolling Stone in 1967 in San Francisco the same year as Monterey Pop and Sgt. Pepper's, run initially by volunteers.
- Hunter Thompson ran for Sheriff of Aspen on a 'Freak Power' ticket and came close to winning, drawing national press.
- Thompson wrote Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas while staying in Wenner's San Francisco basement, on an assignment meant to be a 200-word caption.
- 1972 was the first year 18-year-olds were allowed to vote, making Rolling Stone's campaign coverage especially resonant with young readers.
- Annie Leibovitz went from shooting in Rolling Stone's loft to becoming an official royal portraitist of the Queen of England.
- France draws roughly half its power from nuclear and has never had a nuclear accident because it replicated a single reactor design nationwide.
- Investigators found that 19 of the top 20 Christian pages on Facebook were troll farms orchestrating conflict.
- Wenner claims 25% of all FDA-approved drugs eventually get recalled.
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Like a Rolling Stone
Jann Wenner
“I've decided in my book Like a Rolling Stone available for sale to be honest out now it is out now it's on our best seller list” — Jann Wenner 00:48:35Find it on Amazon