

Their December 1965 album Rubber Soul marked a profound change in the dynamic between fans and artists, as many Beatles fans sought to appreciate the progressive quality in the band's look, lyrics and sound. From the end of that year, the band embraced promo clips for their singles to avoid the difficulties of making personal appearances on television programmes. To protect them from their fans, the Beatles typically travelled to these concerts by armoured car. Their August 1965 concert at New York's Shea Stadium marked the first time that a large outdoor stadium was used for such a purpose, and with an audience of 55,000, set records for attendance and revenue generation. There, the band's instant popularity established their international stature, and their unprecedented domination of the national sales charts was mirrored in numerous other countries. In February 1964, the Beatles arrived in the United States and their televised performances on The Ed Sullivan Show were viewed by approximately 73 million people. Among the displays of deity-like worship, fans would approach the band in the belief that they possessed supernatural healing powers. Commentators likened the intensity of this adulation to a religious fervour and to a female masturbation fantasy. From the start of 1964, their world tours were characterised by the same levels of hysteria and high-pitched screaming by female fans, both at concerts and during the group's travels. By October, the press adopted the term "Beatlemania" to describe the scenes of adulation that attended the band's concert performances. The group's popularity grew in the United Kingdom throughout 1963, propelled by the singles " Please Please Me", " From Me to You" and " She Loves You". Beatlemania was the fanaticism surrounding the English rock band the Beatles in the 1960s.
