All these things, of course, are subject to debate. Is Elvis indeed the greatest music artist of all time? There are some who will argue for Frank Sinatra, the first pop idol. Others will go for the Beatles, who revolutionized rock and roll. But what Forbes.com recently affirmed is something that cannot be questioned. The online version of the famous businessman’s magazine cited Elvis as the top-earning deceased celebrity for the third year in a row with an income amounting to $40 million for the year ending September 2003.
The main source of this windfall was the album 30 #1 Hits, which, as the title says, is made up of Presley’s number one selling songs, which have already been released in nearly countless compilations. Think Jailhouse Rock, Heartbreak Hotel, Wooden Heart, It’s Now or Never and all those other familiar tunes. But the fact that they most probably had them in other albums released earlier did not bother the buyers at all and the album has already sold more than nine million copies after a year in the market.
A new Presley collection titled, Elvis: 2nd to None, which, incidentally, also means number one, came out a few weeks ago in the US. According to the blurb in the single CD Rubberneckin’, the album has "30 tracks, including five number ones, chart topping hits and career milestones and fan favorites." Wonder what these are. This early though, it is clear that this compilation will also do its share in keeping Elvis’ only daughter Lisa Marie Presley and her descendants out of the poorhouse forever. The album easily made the top 10 when it came out with Rubberneckin’, which was remixed by Paul Oakenfold, now acknowledged as Presley’s newest hit song.
Back to Forbes.com list of top earning dead moguls. The rest of the list is as follows: Charles Schulz, creator of the Peanuts comic strip with $32M; J.R.R. Tolkien, writer of the books Lord of the Rings, that have also become huge box-office hits with $22M; Beatle John Lennon with $19M thanks to reissues of Beatles recordings and other formerly unreleased materials; another former Beatle George Harrison with $16M for the same reasons; Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein, composer and writer of famous musicals like The Sound of Music and The King & I with $7M;
Cole Porter, another famous composer who wrote Night and Day and Begin the Beguine among others with $6M; Irving Berlin, still another composer of songs like Always and God Bless America with $6M; Dr. Robert Atkins, who formulated the highly popular low-carb, high-protein Atkins Diet, also with $6M; Dr. Seuss, author of much-loved children’s books like The Grinch Who Stole Christmas and The Cat in the Hat, the race car driver Dale Earnhardt, rapper Tupac Shakur, reggae star Bob Marley and Marilyn Monroe, who all made the top 10, plus in lower rungs, Frank Sinatra and James Dean.
For these pop figures, being dead has truly become very, very big business. Take note, majority in the list are people who distinguished themselves in music. There are 10 out of 19, a fact, which I think, speaks volumes about the power to write or interpret beautiful songs, and immortality. Come to think of it, how much do you think would Mozart, Chopin or Beethoven be worth today if they had publishers or managers controlling the use of their music or of their images? I’d say quite a lot.