“Dying,” the pop culture critic Chuck Klosterman once wrote, “is the only thing that guarantees a rock star will have a legacy that stretches beyond temporary relevance.”

It also still pays well. In 2024, several music greats—including Michael Jackson, Freddie Mercury, Bob Marley and Whitney Houston—are once again topping the charts of the highest-paid dead celebrities. Music catalog income and estate deals remain the top income generators for deceased recording artists.

The King of Pop’s estate scored a huge win in August, after a judge ruled that the $600 million catalog sale of his publishing and recorded masters’ rights to Sony could proceed, despite protestations from the late artist’s mother, Katharine Jackson. Meanwhile, multiple revenue streams keep the dollars moonwalking in, including MJ’s Broadway musical and touring productions. All told, Forbes estimates that Jackson has earned more than $3.3 billion since his death in 2009.

Meanwhile, Queen’s Freddie Mercury remains rock royalty in the afterlife, rejoining the list for the first time since 2020 with an estimated $250 million due to the group’s $1 billion catalog sale to Sony in June. Proceeds were split four ways among Mercury and the still living original band members Brian May, Roger Taylor and John Deacon, according to a source with close knowledge of the deal.

In keeping with estate deals, Ric Ocasek of The Cars (who died in 2019) earned $45 million after Primary Wave acquired a stake in his publishing, name, likeness, and image rights in September.

But it’s not all musicians who are earning the big bucks in the great beyond. The late Friends star Matthew Perry became the rare television actor to ever make the list. (The comedy duo Abbott & Costello—primarily considered film stars—were the first back in 1988, when Forbes launched the Highest-Paid Dead Celebrities list.) Perry, alongside costars Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow and David Schwimmer, are estimated to pull in some $18 million annually in royalties from the megahit sitcom.

And if this year’s listmakers are hanging out at that Great Central Perk in the Sky, there is probably an iced tea and lemonade drink on the menu. Arnold Palmer’s namesake drink generates some $300 million annually in revenues, while spiked versions from Molson Coors pull in millions more,........

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