Has Taylor Swift Become Bigger Than The Beatles?

Words: Dan Smith

When one of my (thankfully soon to be ex) colleagues said to me on Wednesday that Taylor Swift has become bigger than The Beatles, to say I bit hard would be an understatement. To be honest with you, I thought he had gone delusional. But it did get me thinking, has Taylor Swift become bigger than The Beatles? Join me on this journey as we deep dive the ridiculous statement above.

The short answer is no. Thanks for reading.

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The Numbers

Now, we will start off with the numbers.

Taylor Swift Spotify Monthly Listeners – 104,668,203

The Beatles Spotify Monthly Listeners – 36,961,383

So when it comes to Spotify, the most popular streaming service in the world, Taylor has nearly three times as many monthly listeners.

The Beatles most streamed song is ‘Here Comes The Sun’ coming in with 1.3 billion streams. In comparison, Taylor Swift can boast 2.1 billion streams on ‘Cruel Summer’.

Further boosting Taylor’s impressive streaming numbers, she is the female artist with the most solo songs with 1 billion streams and is the first to reach the milestone of 10+ songs with over 1 billion streams. The Beatles only have one single with over 1 billion streams, the previously mentioned ‘Here Comes The Sun’. To finish up the Spotify numbers, Taylor is the most listened to female artist in the world, her recent album ‘The Tortured Poets Department’ became the most streamed album in a day, and a week and the first track on that record ‘Fortnight’ became the most streamed song in a single day upon release… and I’m not ashamed to say I was a fair few of those.

Those numbers all look good for the Swifties don’t they? So let’s move on to some physical sales and number one stats.

Taylor Swift has three UK number one hits with ‘Anti-Hero’, ‘Look What You Made Me Do’ and ‘Is It Over Now’, as well as 26 UK top 10 hits. Compare that to The Beatles, who have 18 UK number ones and hold the record for number 1 hits for a band. These include the likes of ‘Hey Jude’, ‘I Want To Hold Your Hand’, ‘All You Need Is Love’ and 2023’s final ever song by The Beatles, ‘Now And Then’. An impressive repertoire of songs there, with last years ‘Now And Then’ proving the timeless nature of The Beatles. It will be interesting to see if Taylor could pull of such a feat in 20 years, I would presume not.

Finally, The Beatles have sold an estimated 600 million albums worldwide, whereas Taylor has only sold a measly 114 million albums worldwide. We will not go into single sales here as this is a difficult comparison as we have moved more into the digitally streamed era and physical single releases are much rarer.

So to conclude on the figures, Swift, unsurprisingly dominates the streaming figures and when it comes to physical sales and number ones, The Beatles come out on top. So what have we learnt from this? Well not much really, so let’s move on.

SWIFTVERSE VS BEATLEMANIA

As Taylor prepares to begin her UK leg of The Era’s tour, it has already made over £1 billion and will undoubtedly boost not only local economies as she rolls into town, but the whole global economy as a whole. No surprise that she became the first musical artist to become Time’s Person of the Year.

And the hype is real. People are camping out for hours on end just to be closer to their favourite music star. I have colleagues and friends with tickets to her shows later this month and the buzz on social media and wider news outlets is huge. It is the biggest ticket in town and it stemmed this article, but is she bigger than The Beatles. That is the big question, and remember, this is all opinion.

Without bending genre’s or going too far out of her comfort zone, Taylor has consistently released popular music, blending country and pop with catchy choruses and memorable instrumentals. Mastering the viral hook and releasing enough music to keep the content starved Swifty happy has all been enough to keep Taylor at the top. And I must say, it has been genius by herself and her marketing team. Every other Tik Tok has a Taylor Swift song attached, or an advert for her new album. The news are reporting on her every hour. X (Formerly Twitter) has pushed her name out so much, I’ve had to mute it from my feed. Long story short, she is everywhere. But there is a caveat to this.

Taylor is a product of the times. Yes she has played an absolute blinder, but in a different era would she be as popular? Yes she writes her songs, but to me, it is nothing short of of generic, bland pop-music. She is a talented performer but is she the best out there right now? I would argue people like Lana Del Rey, Beyoncé and Lady Gaga would put her live shows to shame.

When we compare this to The Beatles, there music is timeless. Can you imagine in 30-40 years grandparents telling you “you need to listen to Taylor Swift. Her song ‘Love Story’ is one of the best songs ever”. If that was my Grandad, a swift flight to Switzerland would be on the cards. On the other hand, songs like ‘A Day In The Life’, ‘Imagine’ and ‘Yesterday’ will last for generations. I guess what I’m getting at, is the fact that Taylor’s music is popular now, but will that last? I don’t think so. Where-as The Beatles music is timeless.

Yes Taylor Swift is the biggest artist in the world in the social media age, but The Beatles went viral before going viral even existed. They had to stop playing live due to the limited technology being unable to drown out the screams of fans at their live shows. They created masterpiece after masterpiece with limited equipment and nothing but their imagination limiting them. And I think this is where the biggest differences lay. The Beatles pushed the limit of what was accepted in that time, or even possible. Has Taylor ever done this? The honest answer to that question is no, and I would argue with any Swifty that you can’t give me a song she has written which is as musically creative, groundbreaking and brilliant as ‘A Day In The Life’. She has all the gear and no idea.

“The Beatles are more popular than Jesus” – John Lennon in 1966.

However, in the current world Taylor Swift has managed to be the one in a world constantly craving something new. She has somehow created an environment where she has captivated the world and can consistently keep the eyes on her. Back in the 60’s, there were fewer outlets so for all eyes to be on The Beatles, this was probably a lot easier. Not to disrespect what The Beatles did, but in terms of the way they were shared to the world this was way more one-dimensional, with everybody consuming the same forms of media so it was arguably easier to manufacture fame compared to the modern day.

Conclusion

I feel like a lot of shade has been thrown on Taylor Swift there and I can only apologise. I have to appreciate that, for whatever reason, she is the biggest artist in the world and people probably feel about her as I do for The Beatles. But isn’t that just the beauty of music and opinion. We can bicker and disagree, but at the end of the day I just think it’s terrific that artists like The Beatles and Taylor Swift can bring people together and spread positivity. Especially in a world which is filled with hatred and negativity. So if you are going to see Taylor on The Era’s Tour, I hope you have a truly magical time. I guess this is where some of my jealously lay, in the fact I will never be able to see The Beatles in their pomp.

And to finally answer the burning question of “Has Taylor Swift Become Bigger Than The Beatles”, I would say currently, yes but we will have to comeback in 50 years time to see if she stood up the the test of time. She probably has become bigger and more popular than The Beatles in their prime, but again, it’s different times so it’s hard to say. But does that mean she is better? I’ll let you decide.