The Beatles By Years:

When They Released Their Music and When It Made the Billboard Charts

This page utilizes SVG graphs in addition to Xquery to pull in data that looks at the music by The Beatles over the years. In addition to the year of release, The Beatles music that appeard on Billboard Top 100 is displayed.

Graph 1: Years Released

This first graph looks at when The Beatles released their songs, when they had their Billboard top 100 hits, and when their albums made the BillBoard charts. This graph only goes up to 1980 because that is when the Beatles stopped releasing new songs. The Beatles officially broke up in 1970 but they did collaborate after the fact some, which was released as The Beatles.

*Note: The Year That A Particular Song Appeared on the Charts Isn't Necessarily When It Was Released*

Red = Songs Released That Year Blue = Songs That made the Billboard Top 100 That Year Gold = Albums That made the Billboard Top 100 That Year 1958 2 0 0 1960 3 0 0 1961 2 0 0 1962 17 0 0 1963 66 0 0 1964 41 29 8 1965 37 10 4 1966 19 6 2 1967 27 6 2 1968 45 4 1 1969 43 4 2 1970 1 2 2 1977 1 0 3 1980 1 0 1

By looking at this first graph we can see that as a band, The Beatles peak output for music was 1963, but their popularity peaked in 1964. From there, their music's popularity decreases steadily. However the amount of music The Beatles released dipped over the next 3 years before rising again to 45 in 1968.

Graph 2: Billboard Songs

This graph shows how many per year of The Beatles' songs made the BillBoard Top 100s. (This pulls out that particular set of bars from the graph above for easier visibility.)

Note that The Beatles' peak year for Billboard songs was 1964, the year of the British Invasion. The number tapered off after that, but still represents remarkable staying power.

1964 29 1965 10 1966 6 1967 6 1968 4 1969 4 1970 2 1976 2 1978 1 1982 1 1986 1 1995 2 1996 1

This graph shows us that out of The Beatles music that made the Billboard Charts, how many songs each year made the charts.

Graph 3: BillBoard Albums

This graph shows how many per year of The Beatles' albums made the BillBoard Top 100s.

As with Graph 2, we can see the sudden success of 1964 followed by a long, gradual decline, though some albums first hit the charts later than one might expect. See more discussion of that below on this page.

1964 8 1965 4 1966 2 1967 2 1968 1 1969 2 1970 2 1973 2 1976 1 1977 3 1980 1 1982 3 1988 2 1994 1 1995 1 1996 2 1999 1 2000 1 2003 1 2006 1

This graph is interesting becuase of how long The Beatles' albums stayed on the Billboard Charts. This is primarily attributed to rereleases and remasters of their music, along with new compilations.

Song's Billboard Appearance vs. Release Date

This chart illistrates the fact that the year a song was released isn't typically the same year it made the Billboard charts. Note in particular that many of the songs that first hit the Billboard charts in America in 1964 had actually been recorded the previous year, before the first American tour.

Song Released Billboard Charts Years Difference
I Want To Hold Your Hand 1963 1964 1
She Loves You 1963 1964 1
Please Please Me 1962 1964 2
I Saw Her Standing There 1963 1964 1
My Bonnie 1964
From Me To You 1963 1964 1
Twist And Shout 1963 1964 1
Roll Over Beethoven 1963 1964 1
Can't Buy Me Love 1964 1964 0
All My Loving 1963 1964 1
Do You Want To Know A Secret 1963 1964 1
You Can't Do That 1964 1964 0
Thank You Girl 1963 1964 1
There's A Place 1963 1964 1
Love Me Do 1962 1964 2
Why 1964
P.S. I Love You 1962 1964 2
Sie Liebt Dich 1964 1964 0
A Hard Day's Night 1964 1964 0
Ain't She Sweet 1961 1964 3
I Should Have Known Better 1964 1964 0
And I Love Her 1964 1964 0
I'm Happy Just To Dance With You 1964 1964 0
I'll Cry Instead 1964 1964 0
If I Fell 1964 1964 0
Matchbox 1964 1964 0
Slow Down 1964 1964 0
I Feel Fine 1964 1964 0
She's A Woman 1964 1964 0
Eight Days A Week 1964 1965 1
I Don't Want To Spoil The Party 1964 1965 1
4 - By The Beatles 1965
Ticket To Ride 1965 1965 0
Yes It Is 1965 1965 0
Help! 1965 1965 0
Yesterday 1965 1965 0
Act Naturally 1965 1965 0
We Can Work It Out 1965 1965 0
Day Tripper 1965 1965 0
Nowhere Man 1965 1966 1
What Goes On 1965 1966 1
Paperback Writer 1966 1966 0
Rain 1966 1966 0
Yellow Submarine 1966 1966 0
Eleanor Rigby 1966 1966 0
Penny Lane 1966 1967 1
Strawberry Fields Forever 1966 1967 1
All You Need Is Love 1967 1967 0
Baby You're A Rich Man 1967 1967 0
Hello Goodbye 1967 1967 0
I Am The Walrus 1967 1967 0
Lady Madonna 1968 1968 0
The Inner Light 1968 1968 0
Hey Jude 1968 1968 0
Revolution 1968 1968 0
Get Back 1969 1969 0
Don't Let Me Down 1969 1969 0
The Ballad Of John And Yoko 1969 1969 0
Something* / Come Together* 1969
Let It Be 1969 1970 1
The Long And Winding Road / For You Blue 1969 1970 1
Got To Get You Into My Life 1966 1976 10
Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da 1968 1976 8
Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band 1967 1978 11
The Beatles Movie Medley 1982
Twist And Shout 1963 1986 23
Baby It's You 1963 1995 32
Free As A Bird 1977 1995 18
Real Love 1980 1996 16

By using this chart in addition to our other graphs, we can begin to see how relevent The Beatles' music was at a given point in time, and even pick out trends. An example of this can be found when looking at graph 2, where we see that in 1986, 1 song made the Billboard charts. Checking the chart above, we can see that the song was Twist And Shout.

How is this interesting? Well in 1986 the movie "Ferris Bueller's Day Off" was released which was very popular, and a song that was featured in the film was none other than Twist and Shout. The last column of the table shows us that there was a whole 23 years between the song's release and when it hit the Billboard charts!