Jaws, the film widely considered the first-ever summer blockbuster, turned 50 this year—and Mondo is bringing fans an avalanche of merch to celebrate. Moreover, this 50th anniversary merch drop forJawshas revealed a number of demo music tracks, which have never before been released.
It’s a commonly held opinion among those knowledgeable in film history:Jawswas the first summer blockbuster. Part ofJaws' success has come from the horror it’s been able to reap from a mundane beach locale, and much of that quality comes from John Williams' masterful score. Game Rant sat down with the team behind Mondo’sJaws50th anniversary collection, including record label manager Cameron Dean, who spoke about Mondo’s remaster of the film’s score—as well as the two demo tracks the team were able to include, neither of which has ever been released before.
Jaws' 50th Anniversary Vinyls Unveil Two Never-Released Demo Tracks
Jaws' Score Remaster On Vinyl
Mondo’s merch drop for the50th anniversary ofJawsincludes two vinyl records, both featuring remasters of the original score by Mike Matessino. The full remaster can be found on the 50th Anniversary Edition 2xLP—a double-set of vinyl records containing 27 tracks restored and transferred to high resolution by Matessino, approved by Williams himself.
A vinyl remaster ofJaws' iconic film scorewas previously released by Mondo in 2017, marking the first time the film score was put on official vinyl (with prior vinyl releases being reproductions of the score). Mondo added a statement on the matter of this remaster, going into depth about the score’s physical release history:
“In 2017, Mondo released the first actual film-used score for the first time. Many people already know this, but the original 1975 vinyl soundtrack release is actually a re-recording (by Williams) of selections of the score. It wasn’t until the early 2000s that a proper release was given to the film-used score, but only on CD. Mondo had the pleasure of remastering and releasing a beautiful remaster on vinyl in 2017. We worked with a lot of the same people for the 2025 version, so it absolutely served as a foundation.
However, there have been many meaningful advancements in the world of audio restoration since 2017, so we knew we could do something new still. The 50th anniversary was a great excuse to try and make this “The” definitive version of the score and make it sound the absolute best it could - which meant entrusting Mike Matessino.”
Jaws' Unreleased Demo Tracks
The other vinyl released as part of Mondo’s collection for the50th anniversary ofJawscontains some extremely precious relics. The Selections and Studio Rarities EP, a blood-red vinyl with a bite taken out of it, contains two demo tracks pulled from the archives by Williams. These demo tracks have never before been released to the public, with little knowledge of their existence out in the wild.
Dean spoke on this special find, an important piece fromthe history ofJaws. Having listened to the tracks (alternate versions of the mainJawstheme as well as the track ‘The Pier Incident’), Dean described the unused music as “similar to what you’re familiar with” but that “To me, the biggest difference that I’m hearing is that you can hear a lot more individual instrumentation. As in, you hear the individual French horn, individual string plucks, and so on.” He also spoke on how the tracks were found in the first place:
“Truth be told, I had no idea this audio existed at first. We were pretty far into the development of the album release when our friend Zach Grossman (who led this project from the Universal side) called me one day saying that John Williams’ team had a few alternate version/demo tracks that they wanted to release as a companion piece. It was like ‘WHAT? There are demos of these songs!?'”
