10 Legendary Artists That Never Saw Their Last Music Record Come Out

It would have been one of the most poetic endings in rock history for The Traveling Wilburys to be the last thing that George Harrison ever did. He had already gone through some pretty ugly albums in the '80s trying to give the studio what he thought they wanted, and this was his time to just kick back with his friends as they sang classics like End of the Line. The Quiet Beatle still had more to say though... he was just running out of time to actually get it recorded.

With his lung cancer catching up to him fairly quickly after being stabbed in his home in 1999, Brainwashed is essentially the last sessions that producer Jeff Lynne was able to bring together with George's son Dhani, throwing new songs like Any Road in with George's takes on old standards like Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea. For all of the great philosophical lyrics here, George always did his greatest speaking through his guitar, and songs like Marwa Blues contain some of the greatest slide playing that he ever committed to tape, even when he was at death's door.

Swapping between his guitars, ukuleles, and sitars throughout his career, Brainwashed feels like the last statement that George wanted to make, and capping things off with a Krishna chant at the end of everything is the perfect note for George to leave us on. Seeing how he was always put on the side in the Beatles and was jerked around through some parts of his solo career, Brainwashed was the last piece of closure for George to go out on his own terms.