They were both gay?

They both had really eye-opening peyote experiences?

Both dead. Freaky, huh?

None of those answers are what we're looking for, although teenidol is closer than one might expect.

They both really liked pizza a LOT.

Michaelangelo liked to carve death in stone, and Gram Parsons was stoned when he died.

They both died of the same thing.

How's that for a half-ass answer?

I can illustrate:
Michelangelo death = Gram Parsons death

Smacked themselves up with the white tiger to death?

For the record, weren't they both gay? I mean, that whole thing with EmmyLou Harris was just a cover, right?

Both died from lead poisoning as a result of the over-inhalation of non-EPA-approved paint fumes.

Both liked to eat raw dough.

I am gonna say they both carved "David" out of a solid piece of stone.

Seriously, they both died while working on their Magnum Opus?

Does it have to do with Heroin or Morphine overdoses?

Pamela Des Barres didn't think Parsons was gay either.

So far as I know, neither of them were working on the magnum opus when he died. (Michelangelo's was clearly the Sistine Chapel ceiling, which he completed.)

The thing they have in common is not the manner of death; Michelangelo died of a fever (or old age, if you prefer), while Parson ingested too much morphine and tequila.

They had in common necrophelia---and I do not exclude Pamela Des Barres.

(Nor Emmylou, that whore.)

They were both color blind?
They both kinda liked the streets of Baltimore?

Both were heavily patronized by the Medicis.

Both had male pattern baldness spots that looked like Bob Hope.

i don't know but HELLO! long time no see :)

I'm afraid we're still lacking a correct answer.

Another clue: the common element in their biographies did not happen during their (respective) lifetimes.

Both were posthumously named Time Magazine's Man of the Year.

I'm afraid not.

Another clue before I go out for the evening (and the Wombat File rolls on the antipodian time zones):

The commonality is not something they each achieved, but something that happened to each of them.

from the antipodes:

no one kept their gravesites clean-or, er, their gravesites were relocated?

Someone stole their coffins/bodies?

Art had his nose pointed in the right direction, but Velma nails it:

Both Michelangelo and Gram Parsons had their corpses stolen by friends and taken to a different location. In the case of Michelangelo, he was removed from his Roman tomb and brought to his beloved Florence (he wanted to have a resting place across from the Duomo, so when he awoke on Judgment Day, the Duomo would be the first thing he saw). In the case of Parsons, his road manager pal Phil Kaufman stole his coffin (headed for Parsons' family in New Orleans), took it to Joshua Tree, and set it on fire, thereby fulfilling Parsons' wish to have his ashes scattered at Joshua Tree.

Bill will be back next week with your regularly scheduled Wombat programming. Thanks for playing, everyone!

Well, I'm checking in too late to post the answer that I came up with ("Both inspired undrinkable, anisette-based cocktails") but I'll take a moment, as the rain falls like a judgement here in the Central City district of New Orleans, to congratulate first-time contestant and winner Velma, welcome back to the environs our too-long-absent Shauny, wandering as she is the moors of Caledonia, and thank Gavin for his necrophiliacal knowledge.

New Orleans has been humid, lovely, and as usual a never-ending round of opportunities to blamelessly hedonize, in our own distinctly non-exciting way. KF, did you ever make it to Bayona?

I did, in fact. Bayona is one of my three or four or maybe ten favorite restaurants in New Orleans. Had a very odd MLA dinner there with Mike and Lahney and Hoover and my current department chair. But the food was fabulous, if the company was motley.