The Beatles — John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr — formed in Liverpool between 1957 and 1962 and ended in April 1970. Their breakthrough, Please Please Me (1963), began a seven-year run that produced thirteen British studio albums; by Rubber Soul (1965), Revolver (1966) and Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967) they had moved from three-chord pop to symphonic, sample-rich, lyrically literate art-rock that pulled the entire genre upmarket with them. They played the Royal Variety Performance in 1963 and the Shea Stadium in 1965 — the first true stadium concert. By 1966 they had stopped touring entirely; by 1969 they were no longer speaking to each other except through lawyers. John Lennon was murdered in New York in 1980; George Harrison died of lung cancer in 2001; Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr are still working.
All Figures
Rock Band · Cultural Phenomenon · Liverpool
The Beatles
1,960 CE – 1,970 CE
John, Paul, George and Ringo — the Liverpool four whose ten years of recordings reset the entire idea of what popular music could be.
Lifetime
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