McCartney Times

No one knows the exact number of number one hits that The Beatles have had. That’s not for lack of information – other than perhaps the Grateful Dead, no band has been as thoroughly documented or judiciously archived as The Beatles have. The real sticking point is that the total number of number one songs changes depending on which chart you’re looking at.

Today, in both America and the UK, the pop charts have been standardized, with Billboard compiling the American pop singles and the Official UK Charts Company doing the work for the British music industry. But back in the early 1960s, charts were compiled by numberous different publications, all of whom had slightly different criteria which led to slightly different chart tallies.

The Beatles’ producer, Geroge Martin, famously told the band after finishing the final take of ‘Please Please Me’ that they had just recorded their first number one single. Martin was right, but only if you looked at certain charts. Melody Maker, New Musical Express, and Disc all had ‘Please Please Me’ at number one, but the Record Retailer chart, which later became the chart that the Official Charts Company retroactively used as its standardised collection, had the song peaking at number two.

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Source: Why The Beatles’ ‘Please Please Me’ is a disputed number one