Question for Beatles fans

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Foxxern

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Here's something I was thinking about the other day, and I know people in here are pretty knowledgeable about music, so here goes. I heard somewhere, maybe a while back, that the total sales for all Beatles albums worldwide is over 1 billion? Is that figure correct? I know they are the most popular rock band ever, and one of the most popular entertainment acts ever as well, but this number seemed odd to me. Here's something that came to mind:

The Beatles have been around, basically, since 1962. I guess they were another band before that, but I'm talking about the regular Beatles. So, that's about 41 years now. 41 years comes out to about 1,292,976,000 seconds, or about 1.292 billion seconds. So this basically means that if the sales figures are correct, then for the last 41 years, the Beatles have sold an average of one album every 1.292 seconds! That's just insane, but I guess it makes sense considering how many Beatles albums are out there. Of course, feel free to correct me if in fact my numbers are wrong. Still, assuming the figure of 1 billion albums holds, its pretty damn amazing.

Oh, and working out something similar with U2, you get them selling an album about once every 7 seconds. Still not bad at all.
 
Whether those figures are correct or not, the Beatles deserve to sell albums so frequently. They changed my life!
 
I think it's about correct. But, you have to remember that this probably includes singles and EP's and during the Sixties the sales of those records were much higher than nowadays. Add to that the popularity of the Beatles and you can get to the 1 billion number. According to the RIAA the Beatles are certified as having sold more than 164 million records, which makes them the best-selling artists in the USA.

BTW, IIRC Elvis Presley has also sold more than 1 billion records.

C ya!

Marty
 
Foxxern said:

That's just insane, but I guess it makes sense considering how many Beatles albums are out there.


If you think about it, The Beatles only had 11 OFFICIAL releases in their 8-year career. Yes...8 years. 1962 was when they recieved their record deal. Their last official album was released in 1970. This is not including singles, EP's, Best-of's, unofficial releases, etc.

Please, Please Me
A Hard Day's Night
Help!
Rubber Soul
Revolver
Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Heart's Club Band
Magical Mystery Tour
The Beatles (The White Album)
Yellow Submarine (Soundtrack)
Abbey Road
Let It Be

Now, if you add up all of the albums Capitol put out in the sixties, and the Antholgy CD's, and Best-Of's they have 41 albums. Give or take a few.

Still one of my favorite bands though. Beatlefest is in eight days!! :dance: :hyper:


:wave:
 
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And also the Beatles have release several multi-disc collections like the Anthology series, Live from the BBC and so on. The RIAA counts each disc, not each release, so that totally boosts sales as well.
 
Edgette, you forgot 2 albums: With The Beatles (their 2nd album) and The Beatles For Sale (their 4th album). So that makes it 13 albums in 8 years :eek:

C ya!

Marty
 
they count each DISC? do they count both meet the beatles AND with the beatles, then? if i understand correctly, they're the same thing give or take a couple songs and meet the beatles was released in the u.s. before please please me because the beatles didn't really catch on in the u.s. until they released "i wanna hold your hand".

almost like the clash's self-titled album vs. when it was released in terms of when give em enough rope was released in the u.s. :hmm:
 
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IWasBored,

The RIAA counts every copy that has been sold (to stores). So they do distinct between Meet The Beatles and With The Beatles. However, Meet The Beatles is a vinyl-only release so it isn't sold anymore. It doesn't matter whether or not the releases are almost identical, a copy sold is a copy sold. Otherwise you could argue that most compilations will not be eligible for certification since the songs on it were released before...
As for multi-disc copies (Anthology, At The BBC, etc.), the RIAA has the rule that it counts each disc in the package when the running time exceeds 100 minutes or more.

C ya!

Marty
 
Popmartijn said:
IWasBored,

The RIAA counts every copy that has been sold (to stores). So they do distinct between Meet The Beatles and With The Beatles. However, Meet The Beatles is a vinyl-only release so it isn't sold anymore. It doesn't matter whether or not the releases are almost identical, a copy sold is a copy sold. Otherwise you could argue that most compilations will not be eligible for certification since the songs on it were released before...
As for multi-disc copies (Anthology, At The BBC, etc.), the RIAA has the rule that it counts each disc in the package when the running time exceeds 100 minutes or more.

C ya!

Marty

interesting. thanks.
 
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