Winehouse sales spike after her death

Monday - 7/25/2011, 8:19am ET

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FILE - In this Oct. 25, 2007 file photo, British singer Amy Winehouse performs during her concert at the Volkshaus in Zurich, Switzerland. Winehouse was found dead Saturday, July 23, 2011, by ambulance crews who were called to her home in north London's Camden area. She was 27. (AP Photo/Keystone, Steffen Schmidt, File)

Winehouse follows trend of other artists who died

WTOP's Nathan Hager and Neal Augenstein report.

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Nathan Hager and Neal Augenstein, wtop.com

WASHINGTON - It seems to happen every time a well-known pop star dies unexpectedly.

The artist's album sales go back up -- sometimes to levels the artist never saw while alive.

Amy Winehouse is the latest case in point.

In the days following her death inside her North London home, her two albums have climbed back into the top five on Amazon's popularity tracker.

"Back to Black" is No. 1 on Amazon and iTunes.

Winehouse's debut Album "Frank" is No. 3.

The death effect is a pattern that's been repeated time and time again.

Michael Jackson occupied the top 15 slots on Amazon within hours after his death in 2009.
The last album Johnny Cash released before he died, "American IV: The Man Comes Around," reached No. 2 on Billboard's Top Country Albums chart. The last time he'd hit that peak was in 1976.
Sales of Nirvana albums jumped from 122 percent ("In Utero") to 300 percent ("Incesticide") in the week after frontman Kurt Cobain's suicide. Nirvana's independently released debut album, Bleach, entered the Billboard's Top Pop catalog for the first time, at No. 6.

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