Polydor Records

Polydor Records is a record label currently headquartered in the UK, and is a subsidiary of Universal Music Group.

Company history

Beginnings

Polydor was originally an independent branch of the Deutsche Grammophon Gesellschaft. Its name was first used, as an export label, in 1924, the British and German branches of the Gramophone Company having severed their ties during World War I. Deutsche Grammophon claimed the rights to the His Master's Voice trademark for Germany, where HMV recordings were released under the Electrola trademark. In turn, DGG records exported out of Germany were released on the Polydor label. Deutsche Grammophon lost its rights to the His Master's Voice trademark to EMI as part of Germany's surrender terms at the end of World War II.

Polydor became a popular music label in 1946 while the famously yellow Deutsche Grammophon seal became a classical music label. No Frenchman, though, could be expected to buy (or pronounce!) a product labelled Deutsche Grammophon Gesellschaft, so Polydor remained Deutsche Grammophon's export label, including Classical music, in France and the Spanish-speaking world for the remainder of the long-playing era.

In the early 1960s orchestra leader Bert Kaempfert signed unknowns Tony Sheridan and the Beat Brothers to Polydor. The Beat Brothers, of course, were actually The Beatles, and less than two years later, with a new drummer and new haircuts and now signed to Parlophone, became one of the biggest and most influential groups the world has ever seen.

Popular German entertainers such as Bert Kaempfert, Kurt Edelhagen, Caterina Valente and the Kessell Sisters appeared on the Polydor label, as well as many French, Spanish and Latin-American figures.

PolyGram

In 1972, Polydor merged with giant Philips owned Phonogram Records to create PolyGram in the US. The Polydor label continued run as a subsidiary label under the new company. In the middle of the decade, Polydor took interest in the Sex Pistols in 1976, but lost to EMI.

Into the 1980s, Polydor continued to do respectable business, in spite of becoming increasingly overshadowed by its PolyGram sister label Mercury Records. A&R manager Frank Neilson was able to score a major top ten hit in March 1981 for the label with "Do The Hucklebuck" by Coast To Coast as well as signing Ian Dury, Billy Fury and the Comsat Angels to the company. In 1984, the company name was parodied in the "rockumentary" film This Is Spinal Tap, where "Polymer Records" were the band's record company.

By the early 1990s, Polydor began to underperform, forcing PolyGram to gut most of its staff and shift it under their newly constructed PLG (PolyGram Label Group), a cost effective outfit designed to guide its lesser performing labels (like Island Records, London Records, Atlas Records, Verve Records) to continue operating without PolyGram wasting/losing more money.

In 1994, as Island Records recovered from its sales slump, PolyGram dissolved most of PLG into it. Meanwhile, Polydor Records and Atlas Records merged into one company (Polydor/Atlas) and was shifted over to operate under another PolyGram subsidiary, A&M Records. In 1995, Polydor/Atlas became simply Polydor Records again.

Twilight years

Over the next few years, Polydor tried to keep itself afloat with new artist signings, new releases, and reissues, but ultimately continued to become more and more dormant. In 1998, Universal Music Group bought PolyGram. During the consolidation of these two music giants, Polydor's US operations were dismantled, while its overseas branch remained intact with its records continuing to be distributed domestically through A&M and its new partner Interscope Records.

Today, the Polydor Records name and logo is mostly used on reissues of older material from its 1960s and 1970s heyday. (In the United Kingdom, however, Polydor continues to sign chart-topping acts and remains one of the strongest imprints in the country — with artists such as Girls Aloud, Rachel Stevens, Sophie Ellis-Bextor and Kaiser Chiefs. It also acts as the UK label for American-based acts like Eminem and Gwen Stefani.)

The pop factor

In Spring 2006, Polydor will launch Fascination Records - a music label dedicated to pop music. Both Girls Aloud and Sophie Ellis-Bextor will transfer to the new label.

External links

Record labels | Vivendi subsidiaries | The Beatles with Tony Sheridan