THE BEATLES

The Beatles were founded in Liverpool in 1960 and are now recognised as the most influential pop/rock act of all time. The four piece, comprising members John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr, disbanded in 1970 but remain record holders as the act with the most Number 1 albums in Official Chart history.

The first Beatles song to chart in the UK was Love Me Do in 1962, but it was the following year when their third single, From Me To You, would give them their first Number 1 hit. The Beatles' iconic Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band is the UK's best-selling studio album of all time. A Danny Boyle film based on the band's music, Yesterday, was released in June 2019.

In November 2023 the "last ever" Beatles song - Now And Then - was released featuring all of the original Fab Four line-up. Now And Then includes the vocals of John Lennon recorded in the late 1970s and cleaned up with audio technology, along with contributions from Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr and George Harrison.

On 10 November 2023, The Beatles made a record-breaking return to Number 1 on the UK's Official Singles Chart with Now And Then, setting a new record for the longest time span between an artist's first and last Number 1. Now And Then reached the top of the Official Chart 60 years and 6 months after The Beatles' First Number 1 - From Me To You in May 1963. Now And Then also signified another record-breaking gap - the band's last Number 1 prior to Now And Then was a whole 54 years earlier, 1969's The Ballad Of John And Yoko.