Well, I would add Bo Diddley to artists who had a physical impact with their music. And Chuck Berry (just listen to Maybellene). Actually, a lot of 50’s artists made stomping rock & roll with a pretty physical impact. So I guess I disagree with your observation. I don’t think the path from the Beatles’ influences to the Beatles’ early music was that drastic. In the beginning, their music seemed to be Chuck Berry/Little Richard rock with Everly Brothers’ harmonies and catchy pop melodies. Mind you, I’m a huge Beatles fan.
Yeah, nothing like putting on “Helter Skelter” and dancing with your sweetie. 
Seriously though, I think the definition of “pop” some of the posters here are using didn’t come around until after the Beatles. They were most definitely a rock and roll band. If you’re saying they don’t rock very hard compared major rock bands today, that’s true. But it’s an odd comparison and doesn’t make them something other than a rock band.
I concur with this post. The Beatles were most definitely rock. I mean, it’s really inconceivable to think of them otherwise. They completely came out of the rock tradition–imitating it, developing it, and reinventing it. There is no case that the Beatles were not a rock band. Period. At the same time, they were a pop band.
Great post, in particular the above point. With Elvis in the army, Chuck Berry in jail, Jerry Lee Lewis marrying his 13 year-old cousin and Buddy Holly and Richie Valens dead in a plane crash, rock ‘n’ roll was in a bad way until the Beatles came along.
As for my opinion:
“Hot funk cold funk even if it’s old junk
Still rock & roll to me”
A rock band? I’m sorry, but the Beatles are the rock band!
Exactly word for word what I was going to say. I’m glad I read the whole thread before posting. 
I completely agree, although even NIN don’t seem to be too far from ersatz danger to me. Maybe, like Marilyn Manson, Trent Reznor strikes some fear inthe hearts of conservative suburbanites, but that’s hardly the same thing as being honestly dangerous, IMO.
As for the Beatles being squeaky clean and safe: do you have any idea the amount of death threats they received, especially in the U.S. after Lennon’s “Jesus” comment? In fact, that was more damaging to the status quo than anything Manson or Reznor could have said, because unlike either of those two, the Beatles actually drove (youth) culture at the time, while nowadays nobody has that kind of influence. In fact, all the “provocative” statements pop/rock stars have become known for can be traced back to the Beatles and their handling of the media. And I can’t think of another band that spat a bigger “fuck you” at their core audience than the boys did when they released “Revolution” at the height of the insurrectionist rhetoric in '68. The lyrics sound pretty reasonable and clear-headed now, but at the time it was like the generation’s spokesmen were writing them off. There were many ways in which the Beatles were subversive, music being just one. Hell, “Why Don’t We Do It In The Road?” was probably the most forthright, non-metaphorical statement of that particular desire at that point in music, and that was coming from Paul. I don’t get the accusations that they were “tame”. For pure heaviness, “Helter Skelter” or “Revolution” or “I Want You (She’s So Heavy)” can stand against anything by the Stones or the Who or any group on either Nuggets box set. And even on their less overtly “rocking” songs, there was often plenty of tension/anger apparent in the lyrics (especially Lennon’s, though Paul got off a couple/few on Rubber Soul and Revolver).
As far as the NKOTB comparison, that’s pure ignorance. The thing most people overlook (I guess because of all the footage of screaming teenage girls at their shows) is that the Beatles were popular with everybody, from teenyboppers and rock&roll hoodlums to beatniks and intellectuals and music critics. They cut across class and racial barriers unlike any artist you can think of since. Spin magazine, of all sources, put it best when they said (I’m paraphrasing): Imagine if the New Kids morphed into the Ramones, who then morphed into Elvis Costello, who then morphed into the Chemical Bros., who then morphed into Radiohead. And imagine they did all that within six years." That’s pretty good at putting it into modern musical terms.
Oh, I almost forgot: how many other bands do you know of who basically got run out of a country on a rail for refusing to play for the reigning despot’s family at their palace (as happened in the Phillipines)?
Oh, yeah, and yes, I think they were a rock band.
If you consider the fact that Elvis was (and is still, by some) considered the King of Rock, it can be argued that the Beatles are rock.
If you compare their music with what is considered rock right now, they fall into the pop category… and, although their music was much better than modern pop groups (it’s a stretch to call them bands), the Beatles were “pop” in that they were ridiculously popular.
Not that I was around in those golden years, but it seems that there was more definition between genres before the '90s, when the production of original styles of music ceased; Now, there are people who argue that rock encompasses punk, alternative, indie, emo, heavy metal, etc. and others who limit it to bands like the Libertines or… AC/DC? Making a full circle back to the point, it’s hard to say…
Eh, it just depends on how you want to use the words. One could reasonably call the Beatles a “pop” band that ventured into “rock” with Helter Skelter, I Want You (She’s So Heavy), Revolution, and others. Or, giving Rock & Roll a broader definition, one could say that the Beatles were a “rock” band that ventured in the “heavy” idiom with Helter Skelter, etc.
There’s no correct way to phrase it, and the words you use will often depend on their context.
Ian MacDonald on the pop/rock distinction:
Nice cite, VarlosZ! And as far as any chemicals that might have been involved in my musical experiences back in the day – well, it’s a long freakin’ time ago.
BTW, I finally got around to writing the OP of the thread that got me thinking about this in the first place – Voila!
You know that the Beatles covered CB tunes on their early albums?
(Not quite as good as the originals, but respectable rock ‘n’ roll versions.)
And, say, “I Saw Her Standing There” or “I Feel Fine” both rock harder than even Chuck’s version of “Roll Over Beethoven”
(You don’t speed up a little bit when the opening note sustain-sliding into-feedback from “I Feel Fine” comes on?)
WoodstockBirdyBird: I did not mean the Beatles to be included in my list of bands that were “ersatz danger,” only those lesser bands offered as comparatively rockier by whoeveritwas. There was an ersatz quality to the early Beatles, but they transcended it.
Oh, no, I got you. I think we’re in sync on our view of the Beatles. Most of my comments were directed at previous posters - I was just too lazy to quote 'em all.
When I think of pop bands today, I don’t think of bands that write their own material and play their own instruments. You’re just saying what I said earlier, which is that your average band today sounds harder than the Beatles did. That doesn’t automatically make them a pop band.
For the record (groan), I’d just like to point out that The Clash did a similar thing to their hard-core punk fans in 1980 with the release of their triple album, “Sandinista!”
I mean, c’mon, a seven-year-old kid singing “Guns of Brixton”?!??!?!
This is probably harder for younger people to grasp. For a time, in the mid 1960s, pop was rock, and aside from the ongoing American R&B influences from the Motown artists, Ray Charles, and the like, the tone was largely set by British Invasion bands, especially the Beatles. Music was guitar-based, giving rise later to early “garage” trends. But for a while there, you couldn’t be a pop band without being a rock band, and vice-versa.
Good point. You want to really get the young 'uns to scratching their collective heads?
Show them the Beatles’ first appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show.
Watch the teens (especially the girls) in the audience losing their freakin’ minds. Watch the adults cringing in disbelief and disgust.