Swizz Beatz didn’t just want a vinyl collection, he wanted the means to make vinyl for people to collect. He wanted to share his love of physical music, and one genre in particular, beyond his own family. This is how he became not only a collaborator but also a co-partner/co-owner in a fast-growing music company.
Enter: high-end luxury vinyl brand 12On12 and its founder and chief creative Claudia Moross. She first diagnosed the opportunities for not just vinyl but, rather, super-collectibles while working at Cutting Edge Group, which owned the film soundtrack label Varese Sarabande. A commercial opportunity was forming, but it needed a spin to make it unique. Moross settled on the notion of limited-edition records lovingly curated in a manner that revealed a lot about the people putting them together.
"For me, I was like, 'How can we raise some awareness on such a great genre?' I want to create a jazz label, so let's start with it on wax with 12On12 and our partnership."

“Well, first and foremost, the company is extraordinary,” Swizz explains of his reasoning with getting on board with 12On12. “I started off as a DJ so I collected vinyl, but I always wanted to be an owner in a wax company — 12On12 was the perfect opportunity because not only do they deal with vinyl, we’re dealing with art and lifestyle, too. This is the perfect time for people to see something like this come together, and for my first offering to be jazz.”
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