August 11 marks the anniversary of a press conference John Lennon held to apologize — quite reluctantly — for having said in an interview that the Beatles more "more popular than Jesus." In the subsequent decades, "bigger than Jesus" has become a shorthand phrase for the kind of statements that result in immediate rock-star damage control... although being "Dixie Chick-ed" has nearly replaced it as a catch-all for just what can happen to your career after a polarizing statement.

Here are a dozen of the most controversial things pop stars have ever gotten in hot water for saying, starting with St. John himself:

1. John Lennon: "Christianity will go. It will vanish and shrink. I needn't argue about that. I'm right and I'll be proved right. We're more popular than Jesus now. I don't know which will go first: rock & roll or Christianity. Jesus was all right, but his disciples were thick and ordinary. It's them twisting it that ruins it for me."

Lennon's remarks about Christianity on the wane were first published in the London Evening Standard on March 4, 1966, and caused nary a ripple at the time. But when an American teen magazine picked up the quotes, all hell broke loose, and U.S. preachers and even some disc jockeys began holding bonfires for Beatles records. So on August 11, on the eve of what would turn out to be their final tour, Lennon held a press conference in Chicago. “If I’d have said television is more popular than Jesus, I might have got away with it,” he said. “In reference to England, we meant more to kids than Jesus did, or religion at that time. I wasn’t knocking it or putting it down. I was just saying it as a fact and it’s true more for England than here.” Clearly, people wanted to hear the S-word, and he finally spat it out: "I apologize if that will make you happy. I still don't know quite what I've done... but if you want me to apologize, if that will make you happy, then okay, I'm sorry."

2. Natalie Maines: “Just so you know, we’re on the good side with y’all. We do not want this war, this violence, and we’re ashamed that the president of the United States is from Texas.”

The Dixie Chicks singer's remark to a London audience on March 10, 2003 didn't cause the slightest stir in the hall, but after a local music critic offered a condensed version of the quote in a review, it became a firestorm back in their home country a few days later. Nearly every country radio station in the U.S. dropped their single, "Travelin' Soldier," which stood at No. 1 at the time. The Chicks have rarely been heard on the format in the decade since, although their next album swept the Grammys without benefit of radio play. Maines initially released two apologies, but then became emboldened enough to participate in a memorable nude Entertainment Weekly cover in protest against the backlash. This year, she said, “I would never take it back," death threats and all. "I’m so glad it happened. I feel like it sort of freed me in a lot of ways. I didn’t know people were misinterpreting who I was as a person, or making all of these assumptions because of the kind of music I played. I have no problem being a pro-gay, pro-choice, pro-woman, pro-free speech kind of a person."

3. Kanye West: "George Bush doesn't care about black people."

West was a celebrity presenter on a prime-time telethon for victims of Hurricane Katrina when he went off-script with his infamous anti-Bush line. The camera lingered just long enough to catch the stricken look on co-presenter Mike Myers' face before the director was able to abruptly cut away. Of course, Kanye is the modern master of the outrageous (and usually more self-aggrandizing) quote. An easy runner-up in his pantheon on bon mots: "Yo Taylor, I'm really happy for you... but Beyoncé had one of the best videos of all time."

4. Ted Nugent: "If Barack Obama becomes the president in November, again, I will either be dead or in jail by this time next year. Why are you laughing? Do you think that's funny? That's not funny at all. I'm serious as a heart attack.”

Hardly one to ever mince words, the right-wing rocker was at his least mincing when he addressed an NRA convention prior to the election of 2012. By the time he wrapped up his impromptu speech by exhorting, "We need to ride into that battlefield and chop their heads off in November!," it was all but inevitable he'd be getting a token visit from the Secret Service. But that hardly put a damper on his penchant for violent imagery. At subsequent concerts, he put a machine gun in his mouth and bellowed, “Hey, Obama, you might want to suck on one of these, ya punk!” — also offering a similar suggestion for Hillary Clinton.