Founding members of Queen have just become very rich rock icons
By Lee Vowell
Brian May was already a wealthy man. He had a projected net worth of $260 million. That is enough to buy a lot of people some very good sandwiches if he wants. But that number will look small compared to the amount of money he is about to acquire.
The only drawback is that Freddie Mercury could not be around for the band's newfound wealth. Mercury passed away in 1991. Upon his death, Mercury had a reported net worth of around $50 million. That would pale to what his new monetary value would be.
The reason for this is that Queen has sold its back catalog and some other rights to Sony Music for a reported one billion pounds. That equates to $1,27 billion. Sure, there will be attorney fees involved and other trivialities, but assuming that the band would basically split the sale of their songs to Sony, each member would likely get around 200 million pounds.
Founding members of Queen just massively increased their income with new Sony Music deal
There has been no reported breakdown of how the money will be split, but no matter how the wealth is we can assume the living founding members of the group - guitarist Brian May, drummer Roger Taylor, and bassist John Deacon (Deacon retired from Queen in 1997) - won't have to worry about affording literally anything ever again.
The sale of the rights does not include live performances. Queen has been roaming the earth with vocalist Adam Lambert for a number of years now and they don't have to stop. They will keep what they earn as far as tour dollars go.
Next. Classic rock bands with more than two lead singers. Classic rock bands with more than two lead singers. dark
Sony Music's money will go toward acquiring the rights to Queen's name and likeness. They can use these to sell the band's music however they want. Broadway musical? Metal lunch boxes? Billboards? Whatever. If the company spent more than a billion dollars on gaining the name of Queen one can be sure the world is about to be hit with of Queen-related things.
At least the band is worthy of being over-commercialized. How can one tire of hearing "Bohemian Rhapsody," "Somebody to Love," "We Will Rock You," and many other hits? Let's hope we do not tire because if we thought the group was around everywhere before, Sony Music will probably have Queen's music be a part of everything they do for the foreseeable future.
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