How Popular Were The Beatles?
The Beatles were, by nearly any conventional measure, the most popular musical group of the 1960s.
Three of their albums (Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, Abbey Road, and The Beatles [a.k.a., The White Album]) were amongst the best-selling albums of the decade. The Beatles had the most songs by any band in the U.S. top 100 singles during the 1960s, with 69 (2nd only to Elvis Presley). The Beatles followed only Elvis with top 40 hits, with their 44 songs to his 50. The Beatles had the most top 10 hits during the 1960s (beating out Elvis) with 30. And the Fab Four owned the top slot in getting the Top Slot with 18 #1 hits in the U.S. (besting the next highest in 1960s chart-topping, The Supremes, by 8 songs).
During the period when some radio stations were banning The Beatles, there was frequent talk that the band was slipping in popularity anyway. For example, a panel of four teenagers convened by The Delta Democrat-Times in Greenville, MS in August 1966 said that "they thought the Beatles were 'going out' even before the controversial remarks" which led to the bans. Quoted in the San Angelo Standard-Times on August 11, 1966, the owner of a Texas jukebox company said that he believed The Beatles had lost significant popularity. "They've been on the downfall for about six months," Olen Dreyer of Dreyer Music Company said. A United Press International story from London carried by many U.S. newspapers on August 5, 1966, reported that "There has been growing talk here that the Beatles may be on the way out. Their latest record release remained in the top spot for only a short time before it was knocked down."
And it might have seemed that way from a certain perspective. After The Beatles took the U.S. by storm in early 1964, they were ubiquitous on the chart and on the radio. This is a chart of their singles' performance on the Billboard pop chart in the U.S. from 1964 through 1966:
After completely flooding the chart in 1964, the pace of singles by The Beatles slowed in 1965 and 1966. But there were still only very short periods with no Beatles song on the chart. There was a 5-week stretch in late 1964 (10/31/64 through 11/28/64), 4 weeks in mid-1965 (7/10/65 through 7/31/65), the week of 12/11/65, and then 5 weeks in mid-1966 (5/7/66 through 6/4/66).
Crucially, this latter period of a Beatles-free pop chart occurred just a handful of weeks before the controversy erupted near the start of August 1966. And that window of Fab absence followed the chart run of "Nowhere Man" which failed to hit #1 (it peaked at #3) and its B-side, "What Goes On," only graced the chart with its presence for two weeks.
It must have seemed to many observers, fans and haters alike, that after an unprecedented explosion of popularity, The Beatles had run their course. Indeed, the Texas jukebox operator quote above pointed out this change. He supported his belief that interest in The Beatles was fading but pointing out that they had one one song in the top 100 where two years previous they had four. He said about Beatles fandom, "I think it is something that will die out pretty soon."
Many stations that banned The Beatles were ones that played the group only on occasion. It's important to remember that in 1966, radio stations generally didn't have the tightly-focused programming format that eventually came to dominate the radio dial. While some stations played specifically top 40 pop or country music, many stations were "full service"—there might be a mix of music, news, and other talk-based features in the same hour of programming. And the music was usually not exclusively rock 'n' roll. As an example, the program director for WHWB, a station in Rutland, VT, stated in 1966 that his music mix tried to "keep a balance among rock 'n' roll, country music, folk music and standards." For these stations, it wasn't much of a sacrifice to eliminate The Beatles from their record collection, especially as it appeared like the band was waning in popularity.
Other stations might have an evening or occasional show that was intended as programming for teens, and The Beatles were played on these shows, but it was not the station's primary fare. Again, not very risky to ban The Beatles if it only affected a small portion of the overall broadcast hours. Some stations announced bans but rarely played the ban in the first place. Some observers, even in 1966, thought that a few radio stations announcing bans never played The Beatles prior to the ban—and only did so for publicity, out of a moral pique, or both. As the president of Augusta, GA's WBBQ AM & FM, George Weiss, noted to the trade magazine Broadcasting in the August 22, 1966 issue, "It is interesting to note that most of the stations that have banned The Beatles never played them in the first place."
It's also important to keep in mind that out of approximately 3,500 AM and FM radio stations in the U.S. in 1966, the number of radio outlets for which evidence exists of a Beatles ban represents just over 3% of stations. Not all of the rest would play music from The Beatles (or rock & roll in general, or even music at all), but the "Ban the Beatles" movement was ultimately a very vocal minority of broadcasters.