Spice Girls album of 1997 and was certified 8× Platinum by the IFPI for sales in excess of 8 million copies. That same month the Spice Girls attracted a crowd of 500,000 when they switched on the Christmas lights in Oxford Street, London. At the same time, Simon Fuller started to set up million pound sponsorship deals for the Spice Girls with Pepsi, Walkers, Impulse, Cadbury's and Polaroid. In December 1996, the group won three trophies at the "Smash Hits" awards at the London Arena, including best video for "Say You'll Be There". In January 1997, the group released "Wannabe" in the
The Return of the Spice Girls Tour dates in South America, Asia, Australia, and Africa were cancelled. Many media outlets reported that it was due to Melanie Chisholm and Melanie Brown leaving the group, but this was denied in an official thespicegirls.com video message. The band suffered media backlash, and fan backlash, with many fans creating Facebook hate groups speculating the official announcement was "indirect" and that "the Spice Girls and their management knew the dates were cancelled even before they added 16 dates at the O2, deciding to announce it near the end of the tour to minimize controversy." BBC Radio 2 recorded the shows on