Beatles aside, was the "British Invasion" of bands into U.S. bigger than "U.S. Invasion" of bands into Britain?

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1. Yes and no. While the British Invasion bands dominated the U.S. charts to a degree never seen before or since, a near-shutout of American bands for awhile, American exports to England in the mid-60's (blues, folk rock, Motown, psychedelic rock) were robust. But the British Invasion really did wipe the charts clean of American rock and youth-oriented pop in 1964-1965, and British acts remained disproportionately popular in the U.S. well into the 1970's. In the 80's, the playing field began to level out.

2. Go and count the artists on the Billboard chart for the US, and count the artists on the British charts. In both cases, identify the country of origin. I didn't bother doing all that for this question, but that's what I would do next, if this were an assignment. Remember. don't just count #1's; counting anything that made the top-40 would be more accurate. I'm sure there are stats on this somewhere, if you hunt.

3. The British acts had a huge impact in all English-speaking countries, and much of Western Europe, Japan, and parts of South America. Pretty much anywhere on this side of the Iron Curtain. It was indeed the biggest simultaneous movement with the widest reach that music has ever seen, and it is unlikely to see such a phenomenon again.

4. America is a bigger prize; the population was 4x that of England. So American groups didn't have much compelling need to go to England to promote their music. English bands, however, wanted a piece of the enormous American market. America in the 1960's was the wealthiest it would ever be; lots of disposable income for new records.

5. Yes, because it relied on two key technologies that hadn't been used before: television and jet aircraft travel. Those gave it its worldwide reach; without either, it couldn't have happened. Another major factor was the Baby Boom coming of age; young people comprised a much larger segment of the population than they do now. However, as precedent, people used to scream and faint for Enrico Caruso in the late 19th century, however since there was no recorded sound during the prime of his career, it wasn't nearly as fully immersive as the British Invasion was....Show more

Well the Invasion into Britain was primarly Electric Blues of Muddy Waters, John Lee Hooker, Howlin Wolf, etc. Chuck Berry and Elvis had influence there as well and maybe some Little Richard but most 50's American Rock n Roll didn't do as well in Britain as the great Blues masters. The Rolling Stones, Yardbirds, John Mayall and The Blues Breakers, Cream, The Animals, The Who, Led Zeppelin, etc. were all influenced by the Blues - Not Rock n Roll. The Beatles and others did take the Rock n Roll path instead of the Blues path but most of the big name British bands were based in the Blues.

2 - I am at work and don't have my books to look up stat's but the best way to determine it is to see which bands were succesful in which Country and count thme up.

3 - Music is universal, Russia, Japan, Australia as well as Germany and the Scandanavian Countries all were "Invaded" by Rock.

4 - America is a bigger audience - Bands come to the USA to make it big because of the sheer number of people buying records here.

5 - No as I mentioned before - The Blues invaded Britain long before Rock n Roll was ever heard of....Show more

based on the fact that british invasion artists came over playing in american musical styles i would say no.

the american invasion of the UK changed UK music.
the british invasion of america repackaged music that americans already had.
therefore, the american invasion of blues and rock into the UK was more important....Show more