Some birthday present: 30 years after his death, John Lennon is about to have one of his best years ever.
With remastered releases of the former Beatle’s eight solo albums, new compilations, new films and new licensing deals, the estate of John Lennon -- who would have been 70 on Saturday -- looks to make tens of millions without releasing almost anything anyone hasn’t heard before.
Here's what's new:
-- “Double Fantasy Stripped Down,” a new, rawer version of the album Lennon and Ono released less than a month before his death, released Tuesday and already #17 on Amazon;
-- An 11-CD "Signature Box" -- all of the solo albums, plus two discs of rare Lennon demos and a 65-page booklet -- that goes for about $150;
-- A limited edition, white-bound multimedia “John Lennon -- Book of Vision” with prints of album art, the eight solo CDS, for $124.99;
-- Two versions of the "Power to the People" greatest-hits compilation, one for $17; another, for $25 that includes a DVD of Lennon videos;
-- A "Gimme Some Truth" four-CD collection of hits and more, for $38.
And that's just the music. Also coming up, “Nowhere Man," a biopic of Lennon’s youth starring “Kick-Ass'” Aaron Johnson and distributed by the Weinstein Co., out on Friday; a new “LennoNYC” documentary; a coffee-table book; a limited-edition Gibson guitar, retailing for nearly $11,000; and, playing off Lennon the author and poet, a Mont Blanc pen series including a very limited edition of only ... yes ... 70 coming out on his actual birthday for $27,000.
“Between last year’s Beatles remasters and now the Lennon remasters and everything else, this is going to be one of the most profitable years Yoko and the estate have had in a while,” one music industry insider told TheWrap, “and they’ve had some pretty good years.”
Indeed, in its 2009 Dead Celebrities list, Forbes brought Lennon in at number seven with $15 million. That’s nowhere near the $350 million that Yves Saint Laurent posthumously made to surge to number one that year. But, in fact, with the same position in the 2008 list and $6 million more in revenue over the year before, it is a sign of Lennon’s resilience as a moneymaker and cultural icon.
On average, with the constant appeal, to baby boomers and others, of the Fab Four and their former leader and the refurbishment of product, Lennon has made about $10 million a year. In 2009 alone, without any new or recycled product, he sold 109,000 albums in 2009, and 155,000 in 2008, according to Nielsen SoundScan.
His best seller has been “Lennon Legend,” which came out in 1997, with sales of 1.8 million. Unsurprisingly, year after year there is a spike in sales of the compilation around Lennon’s birthday.
