Factual error: In the opening credits, a new model Chevy S-10 is shown. That body style wasn't out till the mid 90's.
Factual error: When August sits down at the piano in the church and begins to play, he plays a passage of ascending notes (his hand is actually on camera so you see it move to the right, up the piano). However, the audio that you actually hear is a passage of descending notes.
Factual error: At the "Battle of the Bands" scene, the kids arrive and have less than the length of one song to get ready to go on stage. (We see the band up on stage and hear the Battle of the Bands person tell the kids they're going on after that band.) Yet, when they get up on stage, they've got outfits, hair, makeup - including fancy braids and spikes - that just plain couldn't have been thrown together in five minutes.
Factual error: When the audience are watching the pilot, Davy says "It's Russell!" But in the actual pilot, it's Micky who says it.
Factual error: In the Pop Goes My Heart video, the keyboard is a Roland D-50. At the start of the video it's said that it was from 1984. The D-50 wasn't released until 1987 to compete with the Yamaha DX7. (00:01:15)
Factual error: Buster Franklin's bass player is playing a MusicMan StingRay bass, even though they didn't appear on the market until 1976. The guitar isn't from the fifties either, but I can't make out what it is. (02:12:30 - 02:14:50)
Factual error: When they are being kicked out of a Corpus Christi dance club in 1961 for singing do-wop, someone screams "We want to hear Tejano.". Tejano music was born in 1972 in Alice, Texas. In 1961, the correct term was "Tex-Mex" which later became "Chicano" which is now known today as "Tejano". The word "Tejano" was not known in 1961.
Factual error: As mentioned before the radio booth should have had sound proof glass, but when Pip's girlfriend knocks on the glass and says "Hey guys you're on TV" they can hear her perfectly. (00:45:10)
Factual error: In the film, John Lennon sings "Long Tall Sally" when it was actually Paul McCartney who sang/recorded the song.
Factual error: Although the tie is obviously done for the purpose of the story, the fact is that Morris Brown would never be given high marks for their performance at the Big Southern Classic. This is a marching band competition, and they do little moving at all, let alone actually marching, changes of formation, etc. If anything they would rank last of all schools, if they weren't disqualified outright.
Factual error: After they finally start spending money, and after you see them in the older model black Mercedes Benz S-Class, you see clearly a newer model silver Chevrolet Corvette ('05-'09), even though the scene is supposed to be taking place during the latter part of 1996 or early 1997.
Factual error: The records played in the fairground sequence "Sealed with a kiss" by Brian Hyland and "Runaway" by Del Shannon date from the early sixties, while this part of the film is set in 1959.
Factual error: In the opening narrative about the first person to call out "America", as the ship passes the Statue of Liberty, it's traveling in the wrong direction - with the Statue entering the screen from the viewer's left and moving toward the right; a direction that would have taken the ship from Manhattan to Staten Island (or through the Straits into the Atlantic).
Factual error: In the scene when Baby is changing her clothes in the back of Johnny's car the lights and shadows in the car are moving in the wrong direction. (00:49:30)
Factual error: When Wayne and Garth are driving to the Alice Cooper concert in Wisconsin, they pass palm trees while driving the expressway from Chicago. There are no palm trees on any expressway in Illinois or Wisconsin. (00:57:00)
Factual error: When young David and his father show up at Ben Rosen's house, there is a Jewish mezuzah (a handwritten tiny scroll of parchment with a passage from the Bible enclosed in a case) affixed to the doorpost. The position of the mezuzah is incorrect. It should be higher up on the door jamb and the top should be angled towards the house, not the other way round. (00:15:00)
Factual error: In the shot where the female band members run from their hotel (in Florida) to the beach, mountains can be seen in the background.
Factual error: The movie is set in New York. When Tony Smerko goes up on the roof of the studio to chop down the antenna, there's a green Art Deco building with a clock tower in the background - the Eastern Building, a downtown Los Angeles landmark since the 1930s.
Factual error: The phone at the Peacocks house is too modern for the time - the cord going into the handset had a clip in cord versus being attached directly to the piece.
Factual error: In the movie, Marcus is out of high school, probably in his late teens, early 20's. Going by 50 cent's age, this would probably put the movie back in the mid 90's. When he flashes back, he's younger, put it in the late 80's. Well, in one sequence when he's young, he's playing with friends and has on red and white low Air Jordan 2's on. These were not made in this color until 2004. Same in another sequence when he's talking to Majestic while eating fast food, he's wearing some white and green Air Jordan 4's, which also didn't come out til 2004, which in fact is when the movie was filmed.