Joe Rogan Tells the Story of How He Got Signed

When you were making $5 a night, literally $5 a night as a comedian, I was so much happier than when I had a day job. Oh yeah. Making real money. I remember the feeling of being able to make a living with just stand up. Yeah. Like what? Like holy cow. And not a good living, just getting by. In my beginning it was super shaky. Yeah. Super shaky. Right. Like I started making money. I was making like a little bit of money in Boston, but I always had day jobs. Yeah. When I moved to New York and then Jeff started managing me. Then I started making money. Like he'd get me booked in places and I was working pretty much every weekend. Who was Jeff? Jeff Sussman. My manager. My Sussman. Long time manager. Yeah. Started managing me when I was an open miker. Oh nice. Yeah, we've been together forever. Wow. He's the best. You still with him? Yep. Wow. Tell him. That's amazing. The best. That's amazing. He's the best. I love the guy. That's great. He's an awesome person too. And just brilliant at his job. Yeah. Super low key. Doesn't give a fuck about Hollywood. Oh, that's great. But, you know. Yeah. He understands it. Right. He knows what to do. He doesn't care. He's like, do what makes you happy. Like he just wants you to be happy. That's awesome. So he picked you up when you were doing open mics? Dude. I was scrubbed. I wasn't even supposed to go on stage that night. Really? Yeah. He came into town. He had managed some other comedians. Remember Bob Nelson? You know Bob Nelson? Oh yeah. Jeffy Jeff's gym. The football guy. Yeah. You remember that? Oh my God. He managed him. Oh really? Yeah. And he produced his HBO special. Wow. And they were parting ways. And they were parting ways. And Jeff was like, well, maybe I've seen everybody that I've seen in New York. Maybe I'll take a trip to Boston. So he took a trip to Boston and just fucking dumb luck when I was driving limos. I wrote a joke that day. I had this joke and I called up my friend Oliver, who was the manager at the club. And I said, hey man, can I come in and do like five minutes? Because I have this joke I want to try out. I said, sure, come on in. And he liked me, so he hooked me up. And I went on stage and I didn't even know Sussman was in the room. Because I didn't know he was in the room, I didn't give a fuck. I was super loose. You knew who he was at that point? No, I didn't know who he was. You didn't know who he was. So it just didn't. It wasn't, but I knew that there was a manager from New York that handled Bob Nelson. I'd be like, holy shit. I'd probably freak out and choke. I probably would've choked. I mean, my act was shaky as fuck back then anyway. You know, I'm only like- Of course. Two and a half, three years in a comedy, something like that. Oh, please. That was terrible. Anything could happen. Yeah, anything did often. Yeah. You know what? It was really interesting. He took me to New York to... He saw me there. And then he took me to New York to try out. He wanted to see me perform in some other clubs. So he said, are you willing to come down to New York? So I said, sure, yeah. I've always wanted to. I was so nervous about performing in New York. Yeah, of course. I thought New York City was different. It was like more nervous than when he came to see me the second time in Boston. I was more nervous to perform in New York. I was like, I can't believe... I was one of it. Catch a rising star, which doesn't exist anymore. Yeah. Just legends. Forget it. Your head. Yeah, that's a big thing. It's because you don't know it yet. Yeah. Well, it was like the New York comics were always like the smart ones. That was the thought process, the insecure thought process in Boston. The audiences are smarter. They're not going to buy your bullshit. Smarter over there. They're going to know you're not funny. They're going to know. They're going to know. And what's really funny is like, Susman, we were talking about like clean comedy versus dirty comedy. There was no really real decision like, you know, like because back then people would like decide to be clean. It wasn't like you're a clean comic because that's how you think. Well, if you want to get more work, the smart moves were clean. Right. As a business decision. As a business decision. Should dress nice and act clean. He took me to this place called... We went to a bunch of places. We did Eatside Comedy Club, which is a cool comedy club that used to be in Long Island. Then he took me to this place called Fast Eddie's in Huntington. And it was a local bar that had a comedy night. Wow. And we went upstairs and it was so... The crowd was so fucking rowdy and so drunk. And there was a dude on stage. His name was George Gallows, hilarious dude. Who was doing a reverse shit with a banana. He was like... As you're waiting to go off. So he had a banana that he was like... He was somehow or another slurping it. Like it was a reverse shit. And he's doing this in front of, you know, these people are hammered. It's like a Wednesday night or some shit, right? And Sussan says, he grabs me by the arm. You don't have to perform here. We're gonna get out of here. And I said, no fucking way. I go, listen, man. I give these to my people. I go, just trust me. Let me go up. My people. I'm like, this is what I do, man. All the gigs that I got in Boston were all bar gigs. Yeah, of course. I'm gonna handle this.