On Jan. 1, 1962, The Beatles flunked an audition at Decca
Records in London. Label executive Dick Rowe's brush-off: "Guitar groups
are on the way out."
It was an inauspicious start for the group that would soon
dominate global society and a downbeat Day 1 in the year that saw the scrappy
Liverpool lads evolve into the Fab Four who forever altered the course of pop
music.
No other entertainers in history have been as popular, as
influential, as important or as groundbreaking. The best-selling act ever sold
600 million albums worldwide and racked up 20 No. 1 U.S. singles, a Billboard
record that still stands. The band hijacked the entertainment media and
transcended music to become a chapter in world history. Its members had
political clout, spiritual authority, cultural sway and the ears of the planet.
How did The Beatles become so profoundly enormous and
enduring? Even the players couldn't fathom such sovereignty. Paul McCartney
expected a brief joy ride when Beatlemania struck.
“Oh, yeah, we thought a couple years, that would be
it," he told USA TODAY in 2009, when The Beatles' remastered catalog
reignited international excitement. "We never thought it would last at
all. You've got to ask, 'Why did it last?' I think the music is very
well-structured, like a good house. It's going to stand for a long time. It's
nice that I can sit back now and be proud of what we did."
The Beatles sprang from a perfect storm of timing,
chemistry, luck, key support and, most critically, talent. And many of those
essential factors fell into place 50 years ago.
John Lennon and McCartney met in 1957. George Harrison
joined their band in 1958, when they were busking in Liverpool. They adopted
the name The Beatles in 1960.
The pivotal year of 1962 saw a rapid coalescence:
"Fifth Beatle" Brian Epstein became their indefatigable manager in
January. He sent The Beatles, performing in Hamburg, this telegram on May 9:
"Congratulations, boys. EMI requests recording session. Please rehearse
new material."
On June 4, they signed a contract with Parlophone, a
subsidiary of EMI. And on June 6, they entered Abbey Road Studios with producer
George Martin for the first time, recording demos of cover tune Besame Mucho
and Lennon-McCartney compositions Love Me Do,P.S. I Love You and Ask Me Why.
Martin, mildly impressed, lectured the band about its lousy equipment, then
asked whether they had any complaints.
The Beatles by the numbers
The story of The Beatles’ influence is as much about math as
music. Reaching the toppermost of the poppermost meant stacking up some of
history’s steepest numbers and sturdiest records. Their impressive stats have
been steadily escalating since the band’s remarkable run ended in 1970. And
with fresh generations of fans feeding the tallies, there’s no end in sight.
USA TODAY's Edna Gundersen tallies some of the sums.
600 million albums sold: The Beatles are the best-selling
act in history, with more than 600 million albums sold worldwide. In the United
States, they top the list with 177 million, ahead of Elvis Presley with 134.5
million.
20 singles: The band racked up 20 No. 1 U.S. singles (17 in
the U.K.), a Billboard record that still stands.
5 chart positions: In April 1964, The Beatles held the top
five chart positions in Billboard with (in descending order) Can’t Buy Me Love,
Twist and Shout, She Loves You, I Want to Hold Your Hand and Please Please Me.
The feat has never been repeated. Can’t Buy Me Love was the band’s third back-to-back
chart-topper, an achievement also never duplicated in the chart’s 52-year
history.
2,700 Love shows: Cirque du Soleil’s Love, a lavish Beatles
musical in Las Vegas, has staged more than 2,700 shows to nearly 5 million fans
since it opened in June 2006.
2.3 million remastered catalog sales: In 2009, the release
of The Beatles’ remastered catalog broke chart records worldwide. In North
America, Japan and the U.K., fans bought 2.3 million copies in the first five
days. Here, the top-selling album was Abbey Road, and Here Comes the Sun led
the song race. Since the music of The Beatles arrived on iTunes in late 2010,
the band has sold more than 10 million songs and 1.8 million albums.
11.4 million Beatles 1 albums sold: In the first decade of
the 21st century, the hits compilation Beatles 1 sold 11.4 million copies, more
than any other album and one of only four to sell more than 10 million copies.
In 2000, it entered the chart with 595,000 copies, sold 662,000 the next week
and peaked with 1.3 million during Christmas week, spending a total of eight
weeks at No. 1 in Billboard. The Beatles trailed only Eminem for total album
sales for the decade, selling 30 million to his 32.2 million.
7 Grammys: Some figures are less stellar. Grammy voters were
not overly generous to The Beatles, bestowing a modest seven trophies, only
four while they were active and only one for best album (Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely
Hearts Club Band in 1967). Voters did start out on a high note, anointing the
British sensation best new artist of 1964.
Sources: Apple, EMI, Nielsen SoundScan, Billboard, Recording
Industry Association of America
Harrison quipped, "I don't like your tie."
In August, drummer Pete Best was fired and replaced by Ringo
Starr. First single Love Me Do was recorded on Sept. 4 and released in the U.K.
on Oct. 5, setting the stage for a musical and cultural revolution.
World was ready for them
"An incredible convergence of factors contributed to
The Beatles' breakthrough and to sustaining their growth," says Beatles
scholar Martin Lewis, who since 1967 has worked as a writer, producer,
strategist and consultant on official Beatles projects, including The Beatles
Anthology.
"They would have been successful at any time, but the
speed and magnitude of that success owes in large part to the times. Britain
was so poor after World War II. In Liverpool, which had been heavily bombed,
the atmosphere was great poverty and sterility and gloom. The Beatles grew up
in that, and their first awakenings came from the distant sounds of rock in
America."
Inspired by U.S. rock pioneers, The Beatles began to blaze a
trail, first with yeah yeah yeahs, moptops and a cheeky air.
"The prevalent attitude among the elite ruling class
was that young people had no say in their own lives," Lewis says.
"The Beatles made rebellion constructive, articulating it with joyous,
giddy exuberance. At a time when cigar-chomping moguls paid people in cubicles
to write factory-farm pop songs for teenagers, The Beatles were completely
authentic, and kids instinctively understood that."
Their camaraderie, self-deprecating wit, effervescence and
non-conformist hair and fashion also appealed to a growing youth culture.
Radio, formerly a fixed object in homes, proliferated in transistor form, and
an improving economy gave teens a disposable income to buy records.
Lewis also credits integral contributions of "three
wise men" guiding The Beatles: producer Martin, who nurtured rather than
imposing his vision; publicist Derek Taylor, a perceptive propaganda minister
who shaped the band's narrative; and Epstein, a tireless advocate.
Talent, while abundant, was not enough to take The Beatles
to the toppermost of the poppermost, to borrow Lennon's pep phrase.
"Unlike vast legions of entertainers before and since,
The Beatles' objective in forming a group was not to become famous or rich or
have their pick of the opposite sex," Lewis says. "They were
motivated by the love of music. It colors your approach. How many kids today
make a record on their Mac with Pro Tools and expect it to be No. 1 in 10
minutes?
"From 1957 to 1962, The Beatles played hundreds of live
shows in front of very few people, making no money, sleeping in disgusting
locales. They had no sense of entitlement. Just drive and commitment."
From Liverpool with love
Only war-battered Liverpool and its sociopolitical dynamics
could have produced The Beatles, says David Bedford, author of Liddypool:
Birthplace of The Beatles and founder of the new online Beatles Social Network.
Yet he marvels that any disruption of the chance meetings and coincidences
critical to the band's formation could have foiled destiny. At every turn,
circumstance favored The Beatles' rise.
"Just as the U.K. charts were growing tired and
predictable, the United States, which had taken the lead with the great rock
'n' roll artists of the '50s, was in need of something new. What happened in
Dallas in November (1963) sent the public into mourning for the loss of a
president who promised so much. How could the country rise again? Four lads
from Liverpool, who were funny, charming and different, came over to try their
luck."
They came, they conquered, drawing 73 million viewers with
their first appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show on Feb. 9, 1964.
"Will we ever see the stars align this way again?
Unlikely," Bedford says. "In the end, it all comes back to one thing:
the music. The songs are as good today as when they were written."
The bulk of those songs, arguably history's most
influential, grew from the imagination and combustible chemistry of Lennon and
McCartney, says Dennis Mitchell, host for 21 years of syndicated radio show
Breakfast With The Beatles.
"The odds are incredible that two individuals with that
kind of musical acumen met and made all this music together," he says.
"What they created was totally original, a starting point for so many
bands that followed. Millions of fans and musicians were inspired and motivated
to a degree we've never seen."
The genius of Lennon-McCartney
Though various junctures and backdrops fleshed out the
Beatles phenomenon, Lennon and McCartney were the only two crucial components,
says Mark Shipper, author of Paperback Writer, a satiric revisionist history of
The Beatles.
"Working together, they were absolute geniuses,"
Shipper says. "The other two Beatles were little more than journeymen who
spent most of their time desperately trying to keep up.
"Doubt this? Ringo certainly does. He seriously thinks
he's the world's greatest living drummer. To those who share his opinion, I
say, put Ringo in the Rolling Stones. There could be no Stones. And yet Charlie
Watts, if he really needed a paycheck, could have played in The Beatles.
"As for George, he ruined every early album with his
incessant clankers on guitar and the later ones with that god-awful sitar. He
sang very good harmony with Paul. But that's it."
Lewis disagrees, arguing that all four brought skill,
personality and grit to the unorthodox ensemble, a leaderless gang of musical
omnivores.
An important key to their longevity was "the sheer
eclecticism of the music, cultural and literary influences they absorbed,"
he says. "Unlike many musicians today, who narrowcast what they listen to,
The Beatles had a voracious appetite for an incredibly diverse range of music.
Their initial heroes were the Everly Brothers and Little Richard, but they drew
from the American songbook. They listened to folk, Gershwin, Cole Porter,
vaudeville. They were sponges."
Had The Beatles not used their influences and curiosity to
push boundaries, they might have had the shelf life of a hula-hoop craze, Lewis
says.
"What added depth to their credibility was a continuing
thirst to break new ground. This was in an era when it was the norm to lay the
same golden egg over and over. You were not expected to become more polished.
But The Beatles set out on a voyage of discovery."
Historical events and the cultural climate didn't matter
much, says Steve Marinucci, Beatles columnist on Examiner.com and webmaster for
AbbeyRd's Beatles Page (abbeyrd.best.vwh.net). The Fab Four were unstoppable.
"The older generation scorned rock 'n' roll at that
time, and for The Beatles to make it through on that level was a heck of an
achievement," he says. "It's astonishing how everything revolved
around them. That's all you heard between 1964 and 1969. Nobody can have that
kind of impact again. It was a different world. We didn't have the Internet,
and people weren't so jaded."
Analyzing Beatlemania, Harrison once said, "The world
used us as an excuse to go mad."
'No one can explain it'
Perhaps the band's unprecedented exploits simply defy logic,
says Matt Hurwitz, Beatles historian and Mix magazine contributing editor.
"I've never figured it out, and I don't think anyone
has ever been able to," he says. "Even their publicist Derek Taylor
told me, 'It's something I've never been able to put a finger on. They just had
an inexplicable charisma.'
"There's never been an experience like Beatlemania
before or since. No one can explain it. We all just love it. It's exciting, and
it makes us happy."
One momentous aspect tends to be overlooked in theories of
Beatle magnitude, undiminished since the band's acrimonious 1970 split or the
deaths of Lennon in 1980 and Harrison in 2001.
"They had the good sense to break up at the height of
their creativity," Lewis says. "It wasn't planned, but it was the
best move ever. The result is we never had to endure the embarrassment of The
Beatles going disco or getting a middle-age paunch.
"They left seven years of brilliantly recorded music
and a perfect corpse that kept the mystique and beauty of The Beatles
intact."
