How Brit Capitalist Epstein Made 1960s Hip Capitalist Beatles Popular In USA

Brit Capitalist Brian Epstein and Hip Capitalist Beatles Band in 1960s

In the early 1960s, most music fans in the USA were more into listening to rhythm and blues and rock'n'roll vinyl records created, played or sung by African-Americans and white songwriters, musicians, bands and singers from the United States than into listening much to rhythm and blues and rock'n'roll vinyl records sung by white British bands. And in the early 1960s, most hip music fans on U.S. campuses were more into listening to U.S. rural and urban folk music and blues vinyl records created, played or sung by African-American blues musicians or white folk musicians than into listening to the vinyl blues or rock'n'roll records of white British bands.

Yet in early 1964 the vinyl records of a British rock'n'roll band of white hip capitalist singer-songwriters and musicians, the Beatles, began to be purchased by large numbers of music fans in the United States. But in his 1991 book, The Beatle Myth: The British Invasion of American Popular Music 1956-1969, "Doc Rock" Michael Bryan Kelly indicated how a white British capitalist named Brian Epstein was apparently able to eventually create a big music consumer market in the USA for the vinyl records of the Beatles after 1964:  

"If ever management promoted a band into popularity, it was Brian Epstein promoting the Beatles. He moved from bars and strip joints, and forced them literally to clean up their act. He specifically had them cut and wash their hair. He also insisted that they watch their language and smile a lot. Teen idols were always impeccably dressed. Epstein bought for the Beatles matching collarless suits, boots, and other items of dress which were all the rage in Paris at the time.

"After he had the Beatles groomed to his specifications, he literally manufactured their popularity, starting when their first British single failed to make the charts in 1962. Brian bought 10,000 copies himself with his own money, simply to get them on the charts.

"When the Beatles' first appearance at the London Palladium flopped, Brian had a photographer take a tight shot of a small group of girls he had asked to scream. Then he sent copies of the photo to all of the papers with a press release claiming that 5,000 screaming girls had swamped the theater.

"Musically, Epstein teamed the Beatles with arranger George Martin, who put violins on the Beatles' records and, with songs like `Yesterday' and `Michelle,' made them respectable enough to be accepted by parents.

"The Beatles' early British hits failed when they were first released in the States in 1963. To give the Beatles a push, Capitol Records' publicists spent an unprecedented sum of $50,000 [equal to over $400,000 in 2018] to promote Beatles music into popularity it could not attain without such promotion. The Beatles got onto the Ed Sullivan show because Epstein agreed to just one-half the fee normally paid by Sullivan to performers. In short, manager Brian Epstein, arranger George Martin, and promoters at Capitol manufactured a teen idol career for the Beatles, collectively turning them from young misfits into teen idols! Had not Epstein ordered John Lennon to never again sing nude on stage (as he did in Hamburg in the early '60s), wearing nothing but a toilet seat hung around his neck, Ed Sullivan (the Beatles' version of Dick Clark] would never have booked them on his `reely big show!'...Capitol sent, free and unsolicited, cases of free Beatle wigs to record stores and radio stations across the country as part of their promotional campaign for the Beatles..."