This article lists songs and whole discographies which have been banned by the BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) over the years. During its history, the corporation has banned songs from a number of high-profile artists, including Cliff Richard, Frank Sinatra, Noël Coward, the Beatles, Ken Dodd, Elvis Presley, Bing Crosby, the BBC Dance Orchestra, Tom Lehrer, Glenn Miller, and George Formby. Some songs were banned for only a limited period, and have since received BBC airplay, while others were banned many years after having been first aired, as was the case of the Cure's "Killing an Arab", ABBA's "Waterloo", Queen's "Killer Queen", the Boomtown Rats' "I Don't Like Mondays" and 67 other songs which were banned from BBC airplay as the first Gulf War began. Judge Dread had all of his 11 singles that entered the UK Singles Chart banned by the BBC, which is the most for any one artist.
History
On occasion the BBC has seen fit to prevent certain pieces of music from being broadcast if it was felt that these recordings were unsuitable for the British public. Files in the BBC's Written Archives Centre in Caversham, Berkshire that are now available for...