Forty years ago, Def Jam Recordings was founded in a dorm room on NYU’s campus. That bit of college student ambition would send shockwaves through music history which are still being felt and still coming to shore. It would help usher hip-hop from an underground NYC music to the dominant form of pop music across the globe.

To celebrate the label’s anniversary, VMP has partnered with DJR on I Need a Beat: 40 Years of Def Jam Recordings, a 5-album, 9-LP box set that tells slivers of the Def Jam Recordings story, providing snapshots of the label as it went from dorm room to boardroom to nearly every room on earth.

Strictly limited to 750 units, it will never be repressed. Own this piece of Def Jam Recording History now.