leadline said:

It is fantastic to see new fans here, your journey ahead will be filled with joy, surprise and fullfillment, but i need to ask a question, and i ask it with all the respect in the world, because the phenomenon intrigues me. I pose this in the most general way possible.

Why does it take an artist dying before people get interested in their music? Was their music not interesting while they were alive?

For example, when Bowie passed away, it was sad to see him go, but I didn't log onto amazon and buy all of his stuff because of it. I made up my mind not to buy his albums years ago, him passing had no effect on that. Yet I see it time and time again when artists pass away, all of a sudden people flock to the stores, flock online, become overnight fans, and to me, it simply makes no sense, the music remains the same regardless of if they are with us, or, not with us. I am very curious about the psychology behind this since it seems to be such a common phenomenon.

Again, not judging anyone here, it is just something I have found interesting over the decades.

Peace

Honestly I only knew one Prince's song The Greatest Romance before he passed. He wasn't really popular where I lived. Of course I knew he was a legend, watching award shows and how he was honored all the time, but his music, I was not familiar with at all. I remember being intrigued one day and looking up stuff on youtube but couldnt find anything. I am a bit young so that may explain a lot and my parents were not music fans. Well my father liked Lionel Richie.