This weekend (September 25th & 26th), we conclude our project Legendary Labels, featuring A&M Records, (Volumes 23 & 24) the most successful independent record company ever.

In the early 80's MTV would dominate popular music like never before. Round the clock videos helped turn unknown artists into household names literally overnight. A&M was no slouch when it came to capitalizing on this trend, resulting in bands like the Human League, The Police and Canadian newcomer Bryan Adams becoming video kings.

In our final installments of Legendary Labels - A&M Records, we present hit singles from the final 3 Police albums - "Zenyatta Mondatta" ("Don't Stand So Close to Me" & "De Do Do Do, De Da Da"), "Ghost In the Machine" ("Every Little Thing She Does in Magic") and "Synchronicity" ("Every Breath You Take" & "Wrapped Around Your Finger"), which helped propel the trio's worldwide sales to over over 75 million albums, while front man and main singwriter Sting would add an additional 25 million as a solo artist still making records today.

We've also got some great tunes from "Joe Jackson's Jumpin' Jive" ("Is You, Or Is You Ain't My Baby?" and the title track, as well as the two monster hit singles from 1982's "Night and Day" ("Steppin' Out" & "Breaking Us in Two"). Joan Arrmatrading is represented by a pair of her best selling albums, "Me Myself I" and "Walk Under Ladders", while a Reggae band from Birmingham called UB40 provides "Red Red Wine", one of their biggest hits helping them achieve worldwide sales in excess of 100 million albums.

Finally, Bryan Adams would also join the 100 million sales club, breaking out with "Cuts Like a Knife" in 1983 ("Straight From the Heart" and the title track), and following through with "Reckless" in 1984 ("Run to You" & "Summer of '69") which would notch 12 million in worldwide sales, including 5 million in the US. In addition, he would become a favorite songwriter for movie soundtracks, scoring big with "(Everything I Do) I Do It for You" from "Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves" in 1991 and "Have You Ever Really Loved a Woman?" from " Don Juan DeMarco" in 1995.

A&M Records would continue to be a dominant independent label well into the 21st century, with more hits from Bryan Adams, Sting, Blues Traveler, Janet Jackson and Amy Grant.

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