Michael Jackson: The Unlikely King of Rock

Jackson's other major contribution to rock music comes with an exact timestamp: Thriller, side two, at the 2:49 mark, when Eddie Van Halen interrupts "Beat It" with a boiling 31-second guitar solo. Even in the wake of Jimi Hendrix or Sly and the Family Stone, black artists were impossible to find on rock radio in the early '80s, but the clamor for "Beat It" forced even the most stubborn DJs — and well as MTV programmers — to desegregate their playlists. "At that time in my life, I wasn't really a fan of Michael's music," says Cornell, who was living as a teenager in Seattle when he first heard "Beat It." "But [Thriller] had a big impression for me. It opened the door for Prince and Run-DMC to suddenly be in the living rooms of white people across the nation."

It also primed listeners for the slew of genre-mingling Top 40 hits that followed: Prince's "Let's Go Crazy." Run-DMC's "King of Rock." Living Colour's "Glamour Boys." Even Jackson's own "Dirty Diana." Most of these songs would have come to prominence without "Beat It," of course, as would the numerous black-rock bands like Fishbone and 24-7 Spyz that would become breakout college-radio acts later on in the decade. But the crossover success of "Beat It" subtly made a point that Jackson would repeat, rather pedantically, nearly 10 years later: It doesn't matter if you're black or white. Not everyone got the message, but those who did discovered an entire new framework for how pop, rock and R&B can merge.

In the end, Jackson's influence on rock & roll will always be more cultural than musical; it's not as though you can go to the Warped Tour or turn on Fuse and come across a bunch of Thriller sound-alikes. Yet for anyone making music now or in the future, Jackson's best moments will always be throbbing somewhere in the background — an undeniable, unavoidable force.

"It's impossible to say, musically, where I may have been influenced by Michael Jackson," admits Cornell. "Because I didn't buy his records and listen to 'em. [But] I think that an artist whose music is on television, and constantly coming out of radios and speakers in people's cars, and just sort of permeating pop culture, there's no way you could say that you weren't in some way influenced by it."