Mercury Mercury
Mercury
Label Profile
For the different label designs and the dating, see the given vinylbeat link below. For a list of albums/singles by catalogue number, see the given jazzdisco link below.
For all unofficial / bootleg / copy releases of this label please useMercury (2).
Mercury is one of the oldest labels of theUniversal Music Group. It was launched in 1945 byIrving Green,Berle AdamsandArthur Talmadgeof theMercury Record Corporationof Chicago, Illinois.
In 1961 the Dutch companyPhilips Phonografische Industrie(PPI), having lost its distribution deal withColumbiaRecords outside North America, signed an exchange agreement with Mercury, and PPI subsequently bought the Mercury Record Corporation and its labels to expand its US base. This meant that the Mercury label was now marketed worldwide via PPI's affiliated record companies (mostly Phonogram companies).
In 1962 PPI formed a joint-venture withDeutsche Grammophon GmbHand ten years later they merged to formPolyGram. Mercury became one of Polygram's flagship labels.
In 1998, after Seagram acquired Polygram, Mercury became part of theUniversal Music Group.
Since its reactivation from 2007 to 2013, the label operated via TheIsland Def Jam Music Groupin the US and byMercury Records Ltd.in the UK. Recently, the label has also been revived byUniversal Music France.
In the UK, the label has been known as theMercury Music Groupfrom approximately 2007 to 2011.
Since the closure of theIsland Def Jam Music Groupin April 2014, the label has been shuttered and phased out once again, this time merging operations withIslandRecords.