45 Reasons The Beatles Are Perhaps The Most Impactful Musicians In Music History
Author’s Note: This is an excerpted portion of a lengthy (30k+ words) article I published 8 years ago titled “My Ticket To Ride” Why The Beatles Are Perhaps The #1 Most Impactful Musicians In History.
Objectivity and the use of specific criteria should be the basis for any claim regarding an artist(s) comparative impact superiority versus their peers. I base my claim regarding the Beatles on 3 broad points 1.) the longevity of their impact, 2.) the depth of their impact, and 3.) the breadth of their impact and then support each with facts.
Perspective really matters. Keep in mind that the Beatles existed for just 8 years and released 16 US studio albums during those same years. James Brown had 71 albums, Sinatra had 59, Johnny Cash 55, Miles Davis 48, Pete Seeger 52, Ray Charles 55, Prince 39, Bob Dylan has 36, the Rolling Stones have 36 and Taylor Swift has 10. And, most all of these musicians have performed and recorded for more than 50 years. So quantitatively, the Beatles are in a comparatively tough spot. Maybe…
Allow me to provide you with a few examples of how this works. Artist(s) who post record downloads/sales numbers without having been the songwriter don’t make my cut. By this measure, great singers like Ella Fitzgerald, Elvis Presley, Frank Sinatra, Luciano Pavarotti and Barbra Streisand are less relevant.
And, great instrumentalists like Art Tatum, Vladimir Horowitz, Duke Ellington, Sergei Rachmaninov, Louie Armstrong, and Yo-Yo Ma heavily impacted their musical genre(s) and future generations of similar instrumentalists, but they lacked the required impactful breadth and depth as detailed in my original essay.
Les Paul meets many of the criteria. He was a highly honored singer/songwriter, an instrumental and engineering [genius] inventor, and he performed in multiple musical genres. But in many other areas, his achievement comparisons vs. the Beatles are not either significant enough or simply inapplicable.
On the other hand, Benny Goodman exhibited many of the required attributes. He had huge record sales; wrote much of his own music; was the centerpiece of one of the iconic concerts in music history (1938 Carnegie Hall); had worldwide success in multiple musical genres (e.g. Jazz, Bebop, Swing, Classical, and Pop) — so much so that he earned the well-deserved title of the “King of Swing”; performed both live and on studio albums with many notable musicians at the peak of their careers; was the bandleader in different configurations including his historic quartet; played a cameo role in a 1944 movie; he and his band appeared in eight movies; was the subject of a successful 1956 biographical movie 30 years prior to his death (Goodman was played by Steve Allen); broke the racial barrier by adding Black American musicians to his ensembles beginning in the 1930s; preformed/recorded for nearly 60 years; and was the recipient of virtually all of the relevant industry awards and honorary doctorates.
If you don’t know much about him or his music, he’s worth your time investment. Goodman exemplifies longevity, depth, and breadth.
Numerous black musicians deserve mention including:
Sam Cooke, who died mysteriously at the age of 34 in 1964, who was both a great performer and songwriter. Between 1957 and 1964 he scored 16 Top 20 Pop hits and was one of maybe two, the other being Nat King Cole, who were early crossover pioneers to white mainstream audiences. He was a huge influence on future black songwriting performers including Smokey Robinson, Stevie Wonder and Michael Jackson.
Smokey both wrote and performed, sold many records but had only 2 No1 hits and no top selling albums.
Stevie both wrote and performed, had 10 No1 singles and 9 No1 albums out of a total of 23 studio albums released. He recorded a No1 single with Paul McCartney.
Michael who both wrote and performed, had 13 No1 singles and 5 No1 albums out of a total of 10 studio albums released. He too recorded both a No1 and No2 single with Paul McCartney.
Contrasting these relative performances, the Beatles released 13 U.K. albums and achieved an 85% success rate of capturing the No1 position and in the U.S., they released 16 studio albums (same songs, but different sequence). Of those album releases, 14 became №1 top-sellers and two reached №2. That equates to a U.S. success rate of 87 percent for scoring a No1 album! And, it took the Beatles only 8 years vs. the combined mega-star recording careers of Smokey Robinson (60 years and counting), Stevie Wonder (60 years and counting) and Michael Jackson (35 years) to just tie the Beatles №1 album record. That exemplifies impact!
It’s a safe assumption that a current and/or future musician(s) will eclipse the Beatles accomplishments. For instance, Taylor Swift is building a very impressive résumé. She has released 10 albums in 16 years, 9 of which have very impressively reached No1. But, she’s 5 No1 albums short of the Beatles whose career existed for half as many years. More about her later. Madonna also had similar impact.
In the relatively new digital age of more-affordable and much more conveniently accessed downloaded music, combined with exorbitantly higher inflation-adjusted live performance ticket prices, which result in equally inflated net worth and other simple metric-based comparisons will always favor today’s musicians. But remember, don’t confuse impact with non-relatable metrics.
My Decision Criteria
Longevity + Breadth + Depth = Impact. Those are my broad categories defining impact and they’re supported by specific criteria. So, here’s my generic checklist.
So, let’s see how many of the criteria The Beatles achieved. All the factual support for each point is contained in the original article for which there’s a link at the bottom of this article.
Longevity
1. They have an historical record-high level of continuing music sales 50+ years after they stopped performing & producing new material.
2. They are the most covered artists of all time.
3. They composed & produced the most covered song of all time.
4. They had all Top 5 Hot Billboard positions at the same time — an industry first that was unchallenged until the advent of the streaming Era, nearly 40 years later.
5. They charted 10 song positions in the Billboard Hot 100 at the same time — another industry first.
6. They are the most frequent artists that charted in the Top 10 of the Billboard’s Hot 100 all-time.
7. They experienced no sales deceleration from their first to their final album.
8. They achieved all-time record album & single sales during their decade.
9. They have the most №1 selling albums of all-time.
10. They have the most №1 single record releases of all-time.
11. They have the record for number of Diamond level albums sold.
12. Excluding Super Bowls, they performed for the largest TV viewing audience of all time.
13. They have the most cumulative weeks at №1 on the Billboard 200.
14. They have 3 of the Top 10 most collectable albums.
15. They have the decade’s best selling album in 2 different decades separated by 40 years.
16. They have a very successful and still-running theatrical tribute to their music produced by a legendary third party 30+ years after they disbanded.
17. Their music & story continues to be featured in movie/TV soundtracks.
18. They are the recipients of all of the music industry awards for excellence multiple times.
Breadth
1. They successfully composed numerous songs in at least 10 musical genres.
2. They composed & recorded 188 original songs in only 8 years and shattered the traditional songwriter/artist business model.
3. They stared & assisted in the production of multiple commercially successful movies.
4. One band member authored several books.
5. They revolutionized Western youth fashion & personal styling.
6. One band member co-wrote an award-winning soundtrack for an independent movie.
7. They introduced existential spiritualism into mainstream Western culture.
8. They pioneered both live performance technology & established the commercial viability of using large public venues for music concerts.
9. They introduced a new musical media format, the music video.
10. They composed original Top 10 hits for numerous other artists.
11. They have [by far] the most books written about them than any other musician(s).
12. They broke the long standing US-centric music industry monopoly.
13. They elevated the market status of several guitar & amplifier brands.
Depth
1. They set the benchmark for the number of A-side & B-side Top 10 hits of their original songs.
2. They pioneered numerous important industry instrumentation innovations.
3. All 4 band members were credible lead singers and had high-charting Billboard hits.
4. Three of the band members were credible lead guitarists.
5. They pioneered multiple important recording/engineering innovations and changed the artist/producer relationship to be more artist-centric.
6. They created an industry-changing concept record album that was a more holistic TV variety show influenced multi-music genre product.
7. They galvanized the striped-down basic 4-piece band configuration.
8. They recorded commercially successful cover songs of other artists and, in most cases, produced a superior version.
9. They introduced Indian music influences to the Western pop music culture.
10. They re-defined the musicians role in the creation of their album cover.
11. They dramatically advanced the future business model for artists publishing their own songs.
12. They turned the mundane subject of song intro’s and outro’s into a compelling addition of distinctive songwriting.
13. They commercially succeeded in employing the frequent use of seamless time meter shifts or signatures without disrupting the listener.
14. They were the first major artists to quit touring and successfully evolve into a studio-only business model.
That’s my 45 point case for my claim. Even when accounting for the seemingly unsurmountable comparison of years as a band and their music production, they still remain king’s of the hill 50+ years later! I’d love to hear from you if you disagree.
Here’s a link to my full article. I recently published an article comparing the Beatles accomplishments vs. Taylors Swift. To access it, click here .
Another Medium writer has recently published an excellent article which explores the same subject from a very compelling and different perspective. It’s a great read. Here’s the link.
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