If RHCP came out with another great album they will add to their legacy and expand the value of their previous stuff.
People are living longer....we could have 30 more years of RHCP
I am not even a huge fan
But if we use this criteria every major artist should sell out NOW
I think we are talking about different things. The RHCP's
creative peak -- a band I don't care for, just for the record -- was a long time ago. The music they make now is not as good, nor will resonate as much with people, as they music they made a long time ago. There is a zero percent chance they make music in the future that tops their previous high-water mark. This is not unique to the RHCP.
The
value of their catalogue is higher today than it was in the year they put out their best music. This is for many reasons but primary among them the fact that their back catalogue remains popular several decades later speaks to its investability. It is more likely that people will continue to want to hear a 30-year-old RHCP track that remains popular today twenty years from now compared to a song from another artist that is popular but came out 3 months ago.
Had "selling your music rights" been a thing for the last thirty years, the RHCP
would have been betting on themselves (successfully, in this case) for holding on to them for this long as there is a chance (and a significant one if you look at the history of rock music) that the right to their music's value would have decreased over time or peaked in close proximity to their creative peak if it did not have staying power, as most music does not. (Imagine the value of Chumbawumba's catalogue today vs its value in 1997, adjusted for inflation.)
If you take as gospel that paragraph #1 is true, then it serves to reason that Untitled 2022 RHCP LP is not going to materially move the needle on their publishing rights as it is (1) inferior output and (2) will not resonate as dramatically with people as the back catalogue.