In December, EMI will issue a Beatles boxed set with several new tunes, at least one featuring the voice of John Lennon, who died in 1980. Previously unreleased tracks of Lennon's singing are being combined with newly recorded vocals from the three surviving Beatles. On one cut of Selena's new album, her Spanish vocals have been lifted from a song released years earlier and mixed with new English-language vocals by the group Barrio Boyzz. It features Hendrix, the guitar genius who died in 1970, jamming with freshly recorded drumming by Bruce Gary, a former member of the defunct '70s band the Knack. Some fans say no, but the dead can't pick sidemen.
Posthumous albums can mean big money.
The grunge band Nirvana sold more than 7 million copies of its Unplugged CD, released after the group's lead singer, Kurt Cobain, committed suicide last year. Selena's Spanish-language albums have sold 2.5 million copies since her death. Then there's the inevitable merchandising. Posthumous popularity, however, can lead to conflicts, both financial and artistic. Hendrix's father Al is suing Jim's former lawyer, Leo Branton Jr., and Hendrix acquaintance Alan Douglas, claiming he was duped into selling them the rights to his son's music and image.