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The simple answer is, they didn't. Firstly, their first article was back in 2016/2017, so the 80m jump is 7-8 years instead of 4.
Then, the massive jump in overall EAS is largely due to readjustment of figures compared to the 2017 article (like increases in physical singles and digital sales, avenues that have been dead for long now), as well as the inclusion of sales from the solo members' compilations that were generated from the back of the band's catalog, as well as perhaps the inclusion of minor comps that were not included in the 2017 article.
No doubt the Beatles move significant catalog units, as shown by their daily streams increases that amounts to around 4m units per year. Plus, their album sales increased a lot, which I assume is part readjusted estimations and part increased catalog sales. But they certainly didn't move 80m since their last article.
My guess is, they are currently averaging around 5-6m EAS per year, and if we assume they sold that same amount in the last 7-8 years, that's around 40m EAS moved organically since the last article. Of course, it could be lower as the streams were not as strong in the late 2010s compared to now.
Guillaume, firstly, a huge congratulations to you and your team.
The Beatles EAS has risen by 112 million EAS since 2017 when they were first studied and by 92 million from the last figure prior to the update (426 million).
I understand from the answers you have given to others that a large proportion of this increase was due to reassigning material originally attributed elsewhere and possibly through newer more accurate avenues of assessing the data.
Would you expect similarly/proportionately large increases for other very successful artists (MJ, Queen, Elvis etc) being updated in future or was this a result of circumstances particular to The Beatles?
The Beatles update has also had a huge impact on the ASR scale!?!
Quite mind blowing. Major thanks for the effort of making this quintuple analysis!
Are you saying they sold more in the 90s than in the 60s? Can Guillaume confirm?
Hi all!
First of all thank you for your nice words, it was in fact a lot of work, hundreds of hours, but the final result is satisfying!
There are already many questions, and of course their huge increase compared to 2016's publication requires more insights, so here they are!
A) Ongoing sales
Naturally, I added their recent catalog sales. While pure sales are dreadful lately, an album like Abbey Road still sold 1.3 million pure in the US alone since 2017, and the band's catalog 5 million. About twice as much worldwide. No need to say they also have recurrent streams, pacing at 10,000 EAS per day.
B) Untapped sales
1) Newsstands series
I uncovered these 'hidden' sales in a dedicated article a couple of years ago. Some countries have the tradition of series coming out on newsstands, with one album newly available every week. As a specific point of sale, these units are always ignored from official charts and certifications. It may impact even the most well known cases, like Abbey Road selling 60,000 LPs in 2016 in the UK in a completely unnoticed way. Their entire catalog was run 4 times between 2012 and 2019 in Italy alone, selling over 1.5 million copies - worth 25 platinum awards, albeit ignored in full. Overall, the Beatles sold over 5 million copies from these series.
2) Budget releases
My belief was that the Beatles' albums were never cheap. In general that's true, but there have been exceptions. They are impactful, especially when the budget album is one that you though was out of print. A good example is A Collection of Beatles Oldies. It had a great run on UK charts in late 60s, but felt forgotten after Red & Blue compilations came out in 1973. In truth, it kept selling well into the 80s, getting re-released by budget label Fame in 1983. As a reminder, budget releases are not allowed to chart. Its former estimate of 250k UK sales has been revised at 650k thanks to Discogs data. Same story elsewhere, with its European total flying from 500k to 1.65 million.
Another case are Rock 'n' Roll Music 1 & 2, released in 1980. They went Plat in the US and Canada, and sold well in Latin America, but as they didn't chart anywhere in Europe nor in Australia, I though they weren't released there. In truth, they came out through another budget label, Music For Pleasure. In Europe/Australia, it appears they sold 900k and 700k, respectively. The Beatles At The Hollywood Bowl is also impacted, just like countless "Beatles' First" type releases.
3) Imports / Exports
It feels natural to set at 0 sales of records not released in a market. Not with the Beatles. Discogs, one more time, shed some light on this. It appears that the 'US' albums sold great volumes as exports globally, just like many 'European' albums (the early UK albums, 'Oldies', etc) sold well as imports in the US throughout the 70s and the 80s, before the arrival of the 1987 CD reissues which at last standardized their catalog globally. Meet The Beatles! for example, widely seen as a North American release, sold nearly a million elsewhere, 300k+ in Japan, 200k+ in Mexico (it was released there, albeit with a different name), and 150k in Europe, mostly through imports.
There are also various cheap releases that got exported extensively, the wildest example is German's Greatest from 1965. It was estimated at 50k, due to its modest showing on German charts back then. In truth, it kept selling for many years, and in many countries, adding to 875,000 sales overall. 1970's Hey Jude also appeared to be a great seller in countries it never charted. It's hard to value how many sales these 'blank cells' (for unreleased material in the related country) have added now that they were filled in, but it should be something like 6-10 million.
4) Loopholes
These are releases regarded as unofficial from a foreigner perspective, often recycling bootlegs, but released as an official product in a specific country thanks to a 'hole' in the local copyrights rules. A prime example is Eternal Grooves which released 41 Beatles' albums in Japan, many of which charted. They sold over half a million units with these somewhat official albums in Japan alone.
5) Minor releases
My former sheet, built with albums that charted in the main markets, had 88 albums listed. The new one, built thanks to Discogs, has 318, with some mergers (like the 41 Eternal Grooves albums listed as 1 entry).
Of course, many of the smallest releases sold a few thousands only, but there are also dozens of the newly listed albums that sold in 6 digits. For example, 1979's 1st Live Recordings volume 1 and 2 sold over 230k each.
6) Local releases
An extension of the previous point are local releases from already identified albums. These are typically Eastern Europe releases of international products. During the USSR era, most international albums weren't released in Eastern Europe, and estimates are done accordingly. Some albums do get a release here and there though, often with awkward situations. In Germany, Red sold about 2.44m units, Blue 2.35m. Yet, while the former wasn't released in GDR, the latter was, selling an additional 275k. These GDR sales are ignored by official German certifications. They also got a 1965 best of from there, a 1983 best of while both A Collection of Beatles Oldies and Love Songs were released too.
In USSR, none of their studio albums was released, none except A Hard Day's Night, which sold a whopping 700k. There have been also specific releases from Bulgaria, Yugoslavia, etc.
7) Chinese DLs
These do not add for much in the big picture, but the Beatles are one of the rare artists that got Chinese downloads from legacy releases. Overall their catalog sold 362k on this format.
C) Adjustments / Fixes
1) Solo sales distributions
As already stated, we refined the CSPC method after the first publication of the Beatles to take into account former members of a band who continue to exploit the band catalog once they move solo. It's very visible with McCartney's live sets, or Harrison's 1976 best of which outsold McCartney's/Lennon's thanks to the Beatles songs on it. In total, 22 million sales are re-allocated to the Beatles, close to 14m coming from McCartney, over 4m from each Lennon and Harrison, and 400k from Starr.
These sales explain in good part the special jump from Abbey Road, as both Harrison and Starr got 'their' biggest songs on it, so almost all their reassigned sales to the band go to Abbey Road.
2) German Horzu releases
The only time the Beatles' studio albums were certified in Germany was in 1993, their big two Pepper and Abbey Road went Plat (500k), while Rubber Soul and With the Beatles went Gold (250k). The absence of award for Revolver for example, capped the potential of Rubber Soul, estimated just ahead of 250k as both sold almost the same there as elsewhere.
Again thanks to Discogs, it appears that 5 of their albums weren't released by EMI/Parlophone, but by Hor Zu magazine company. These are Pepper's (200k+ sales), PPM, Help!, Revolver, and MMT, with these four avering over 100k sales through this label. These sales weren't considered on certifcations, which led to wrong conclusions. Charts & catalog sales patterns suggest 400k+ sales for Rubber Soul up to 1993. I had to assume dysmal catalog sales to fit with the official certifications. In reality, it really was a 400k+ seller rather than just over 250k, as 'Revolver' absence of certification was simply due to the Hor Zu situation. This revised upwards many of their albums.
3) Australian certifications
In a similar way, digging Discogs & our new tool converting charts into sales, I came to the conclusion that the major 2009 certification audit for the Beatles covered only their CD releases. I always felt it was the case, as a monster like Abbey Road at 3xP felt bogus, but without Discogs it was difficult to assume. It's confirmed by the absence of LP-only albums from this audit, like The Beatles Ballads and The Number Ones, two #1 compilations in the 80s. Once we know the limited coverage of the awards, their career total goes from 5.3m to 7.7m in this market.
4) Comprehensiveness of Soundscan
Some 90s US sales actually went down. Live at the BBC from 1.9m to 1.73m, and Anthology 1 from 4.4m to 4.2m. The situation of the 3 'Anthology' albums is well known, with their Soundscan figures falling short of their certifications despite the fact the Beatles' albums were notably absent from music clubs. These gaps led me to assume that for some reason, Soundscan sales only covered 85%-ish of the Beatles in early/mid 90s.
After digging the data again, I managed to at last understand that gap. It was due to the version exclusive to Best Buy, which added the Rare Photos & Interview CD. I was thus able to gauge sales of these exclusives (490k for Anthology 1, 350k for 2, 265k for 3) to fine tune the US sales figure, rather than simply multiply the Soundscan number. As fans prefered this version, the drop in sales of 2/3 compared to Anthology 1 wasn't as sharp, which means that the flat extrapolation of inflating this one. Once we understood the missing Soundscan sales came from these exclusives, I also removed the extra sales assumption for Live at the BBC, as it appears that it wasn't concerned.
There are much more cases of adjustments/fixes limited to one album/one country, many that I do not have in mind anymore (I just went through way too many numbers during this update). Points 2 and 3 are some striking examples of official data corrupting our interpretation of sales. And point 4 reflects well how precise we can be with Discogs. I may have left out a significant adjustment, actually I finished with McCartney so I started to forget already some updates, so if you still have questions feel free to ask!
Hi Smiley!
Among major artists, the Beatles were the only one with a CSPC done before I started using Discogs. That's why their jump is so high (see my other answer for all the details). For Elvis or Queen, their series/loopholes etc were already considered the last time I did them. And of course they do not get these sales reassigned from solo members. An update would obviously refine some data, possibly untape a few previous holes, but nowhere near to the extent of the Beatles!
These are the oldest CSPCs among 100m+ sellers:
- Led Zeppelin
- U2
- Fleetwood Mac
- Bob Dylan
- ABBA
- Bon Jovi
- The Rolling Stones
- David Bowie
Among these, artists who debuted later on, say Madonna, Bon Jovi or U2, aren't concerned by these budget German releases and the likes that add for so many sales. Then Fleetwood Mac for example may not be so impacted either because there are many 'untapped' markets where they did not sell that much. Also Led Zeppelin have very few minor compilations as far as I can see, although their estimates are really old. Intuitively I would say that the main contenders for a growth similar to the Beatles, albeit at their level (so divide numbers by 2+), are the Rolling Stones.
Thank you for the response.
That's very interesting and only makes their total more impressive to my mind...
The Beatles’s Billboard 200 entries, ranked by weeks in top 10 ( November 21 , 2024 ) :
1. 35, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967)
2. 28, Abbey Road (1969)
3. 28, A Hard Day's Night (Soundtrack) (1964)
4. 21, Meet the Beatles! (1964)
5. 20, 1 (2000)
6. 18, Something New (1964)
7. 16 , The Beatles [White Album] (1968)
8. 16, Beatles '65 (1964)
9. 15 , Revolver (1966)
10. 15, Help! (Soundtrack) (1965)
11. 15, The Beatles' Second Album (1964)
12. 15, Introducing...The Beatles (1964)
13. 14, Rubber Soul (1965)
14. 14, Magical Mystery Tour (Soundtrack) (1967)
15. 13, Beatles VI (1965)
16. 11, The Beatles 1967-1970 (1973)
17. 11 , Let It Be (Soundtrack) (1970)
18. 11, Hey Jude (1970)
19. 9, Yesterday And Today (1966)
20. 9, Rock 'n' Roll Music (1976)
21. 8, The Beatles 1962-1966 (1973)
22. 7, Love (2006)
23. 6, Yellow Submarine (1969)
24. 6, Anthology 1 (1995)
25. 5, The Beatles' Story (1964)
26. 4, Anthology 2 (1996)
27. 4, The Beatles At The Hollywood Bowl (1977)
28. 3, Live At The BBC (1994)
29. 2, Anthology 3 (1996)
30. 1, Let It Be...Naked (2003)
31. 1, On Air: Live At The BBC Volume 2 (2013)
32. 1, Live At The Hollywood Bowl (2016)
Total : 382 weeks .
Hi TTV365!
We were supposed to move on Bing Crosby, we started him actually, but as we won't have time to finish this CSPC for Christmas (which is the whole point with Bing tbh) we will delay his posting.
Thus, next up are EXO / Pearl Jam (they are tied), we drafted both files. Also Seventeen, that we may post first since after Taylor Swift they are the greatest selling act right now, and we still never mentioned them which feels bogus! The target is to get these 3 CSPCs out relatively soon.
These results are mind-blowing. Would the Abbey Road results place it in the top 10 EAS albums of all time?
Just one thing here--"The Beatles remain the only act with back-to-back-to-back US #1 singles". Curious about this. I thought Whitney Houston set this record? She had 7 consecutive number one hits which is still a record to this day.
