The Numero Group Hires Tim Zawada, Founder of Star Creature Universal Vibrations, as Managing Director
New Initiatives Implemented in Their Transition to 21st Century Rights Management Company
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As The Numero Group continues its expansion from revered reissue label into a holistic rights management organization, tailor made for the 21st Century, the company is excited to announce the hiring of Tim Zawada as their new Managing Director. Until now, Tim Zawada has run his own record label, Star Creature Universal Vibrations, cultivating a cult following through expert curation and limited pressings of modern disco, boogie, electronic soul music and beyond.
A fellow Chicago-native, Tim Zawada joins Numero's headquarters there. As a graduate of the Master's program at Indiana University's Kelley School of Business, he has also spent years in Bloomington, steeping himself in the same culture and community where Numero's fellow Secretly affiliates Dead Oceans, Jagjaguwar, and Secretly Canadianare rooted. On his new role, Zawada says:
"I've spent the last decade living two parallel lives with Numero Group being the perfect intersecting destination. Beyond the music, what attracted me to Numero was the size, strength and depth of the catalog, plus the absolute tenacity of their release schedule. This is a company that I can bring my operational and technical skills to help really scale and mature into the modern media company. We're building custom CRM and ERP tools from scratch, adding automation to handle analytics, reporting, and KPI metrics - all to free up our creative staff to creatively operate."
Numero Group Co-Founder Rob Sevier adds, "I first knew of Tim Zawada as someone who DJ'd opposite nights from me at the same 4AM bar, then through his excellent boutique label, Star Creature. When I found out that besides late nights and small labels, he, like me, had a penchant for data science, I knew I wanted to work with him. I'm very excited to open this new chapter of The Numero Group history."
"I've long admired Tim's Star Creature label - his unique aesthetic and taste give Numero yet another weapon in our A&R arsenal," Numero Co-Founder Ken Shipley agrees. "Tim's twin attack of business and tech savvy is the piece we've been missing in our pursuit to transform this humble record company into a 21st century rights management organization."
In 2021, The Numero Group will release a box set of Blondie recordings from their legendary 1974-1982 run, following a worldwide joint venture they formed with the band and Universal Music Group in 2020. The company is also planning a 25th Anniversary edition of Unwound's seminal Repetition, a box set from Pastor T.L. Barrett, records from A.R.T Wilson and more.
Through intense research, wild ideas and the unparalleled ear for potential, The Numero Group has built its own esoteric ecosystem by unearthing long-lost sounds for brand new listeners. Out of complete obscurity, they have relaunched songs like Bernadette Carroll's "Laughing On The Outside" to 30 million Spotify streams, Netflix syncs and TikTok trends. Similar levels of grassroots phenomena extend to regional music from West Africa's Upper Volta that was recorded in the 1960s and 70s, as well as Rupa's Disco Jazz, an Indian disco record that's now amassing millions of streams and cracking YouTube algorithms nearly 40 years after its original release.
Records released by The Numero Group have recently been sampled by The Avalanches, Freddie Gibbs, The Knocks and many more, and in 2020 alone the company acquired a new flurry of catalogs from Chicago soul stalwart Syl Johnson, jazz-fusion pioneer Lenny White, Dick Sutphen's long-running new age and meditation label Valley of the Sun, Ohio soul and doo-wop powerhouse Tammy Records, and England's Reflection Records and V4Visions.
With fresh initiatives being implemented by Tim Zawada, Numero will further extend their reach to new sounds, fans and unsung periods of music history, while streamlining their operations like never before.
About The Numero Group
In the growing noise of the so-called reissue field, The Numero Group remains distinct in its quality: deeply researched, expertly resuscitated and lavishly packaged box sets, playlists and ephemera of historic music from the 1950s-1990s. Founded in Chicago in 2003 by Rob Sevier and Ken Shipley, for more than 15 years Numero has committed to unearthing precious lost sounds for new audiences, with an unparalleled ear for potential and spirited eye for detail. With hundreds of titles in their diverse catalog of LPs, CDs, cassettes, 45s, 12-inch singles and playlists, each Numero production illuminates the often herculean efforts of individuals who sang, played, recorded and peddled their art to little fanfare in its day.
Through intense research and wild ideas, these songs find new life in streaming, lovingly-packaged media and placement in film and television. By self-imposed law, everything assembled by Numero is a stunning new artifact of sound, image and word. There's no basement too dank, no box too dusty for their intrepid team of researchers, writers, producers and engineers.
Follow The Numero Group
For more information, contact Matt Hanks or Greg Jakubik at Shore Fire Media,
(718) 522-7171