CSPC: The Beatles Popularity Analysis

Physical Singles Sales – Part 1

Please Please Me (1963) – 2,535,000 equivalent albums

Misery – 125,000
Boys – 50,000
Please Please Me – 2,300,000
Love Me Do – 2,650,000
Baby It’s You – 375,000
Do You Want to Know a Secret? – 1,250,000
Twist and Shout – 1,700,000

With the Beatles (1963) – 255,000 equivalent albums

All My Loving – 550,000
Please Mister Postman – 100,000
Roll Over Beethoven – 200,000

Beatles for Sale (1964) – 840,000 equivalent albums

Rock and Roll Music – 650,000
Eight Days a Week – 2,150,000

Well, it’s difficult to make a definitive list of which single was part of an album or not. For example, in the US, where it sold the majority of its copies, Twist and Shout was part of Introducing… the Beatles, a Vee-Jay label local album. In fact, none of the albums from this page was released in the US before 1987. Anyway, in terms of created value, the song came out within’ Please Please Me LP.

Anyway, technicalities apart, after a string of big 1963 hits in the UK, the Beatles stormed into the US charts like no one else in 1964, destroying everything. At the end of their first year, they had amassed an unreal 30 Hot 100 hits including 6 chart toppers. Not all of them are there, many belong to the Orphan Album category. Still, those albums are responsible for singles moving 12 million physical copies combined, more than 8 million of which managed by Please Please Me hits.