Intriguing question i have to admit. Is it possible? It’s true that Beatles were huge as people were crazy for those guys. Not forgetting the merchandise everywhere such as board games, playing cards, collectibles etc. In simple words they were a phenomenon.
But at the right time could a band emerge and actually surpass the Beatles? The only artist who comes to mind, who has equalled or perhaps surpassed the Beatles is Michael Jackson.
Please post your comments on the possible coming of a phenomenon that could rival the Beatles. Could it happen? How could it happen?
I don’t think any band will ever reach the level of popularity that The Beatles achieved. My main reasoning for this is that the way people access and listen to music these days is completely different to the way people did it back in the 1960s.
In the 60′s music distribution was extremely centralized. People accessed music through a small number of sources. At the time people could buy music from only a few places (and these places only stocked a few number of bands)… it makes sense that the best band at the time would be extremely popular and reach a large section of the population.
The difference today is not the amount of people listening to music. The proportion of the population that listened to music in the 1960s would be roughly similar to the proportion today. The difference is that we have a large number of people releasing music and very easy access to music (the internet). No longer does the majority of the population just listen to the one thing. Today the audience is completely fragmented. There are less people overall listening to the most popular artists. There are just far to many musical options these days.
That doesn’t mean that bands today can’t be as creative and experimental as The Beatles. It just means that today, even great bands of beatles quality will be unable to reach a proportion of the population that the beatles were able to achieve
if you could help me out i’d appreciate it. thanks.