According to Trent Reznor, Beats Music, the new streaming service he’s been working on with Beats Electronics (the headphones, yes), is “a game-changer.” A couple of months ago, we heard from Beats Music President Luke Wood that the service would be launching, in full, within a few months. It’s been in private alpha for some time, but now we’re finally getting a hard-ish release date.

According to CEO Ian Rogers, Beats Music is set to launch in the US in January 2014.

“If you’ve spent any time around me in the past six months you’ve surely seen me buried in my phone making playlists, poking, prodding, and testing our forthcoming service, Beats Music. Sincere thanks to those who have been testing the private Alpha-turned-Beta along with me. We’re nearly ready for liftoff. Thanks to your diligent testing and feedback we are locked and loaded, ready to launch here in the US in January, 2014,” says Rogers.

Claim your Beats Music username now: http://t.co/6o2tB8HzIR #beatsmusic coming in January.

— ian c rogers (@iancr) December 4, 2013

“When I joined Beats Music in January I’d expected we’d get this out the door before the end of the year. Thankfully I work with people who have patience and are more concerned about getting Beats Music right than pushing it out the door. In retrospect we’ve accomplished far more this year than I’d imagined possible.”

Beats Music has a few high-profile names working on its development, including Trent Reznor and Rob Sheridan.

Meanwhile, the game-changing music service I’ve been working on for the last few years launches in Jan: http://t.co/g9nJYzhdbu

— Trent Reznor (@trent_reznor) December 4, 2013

The @BeatsMusic service I’ve been developing with @trent_reznor @FredricVinna @iancr & many more launches in January: http://t.co/EAc52bCHQi

— Rob Sheridan (@rob_sheridan) December 4, 2013

According to Rogers, Beats Music is currently in internal, private beta “with people who know and love music.” They’re apparently still tweaking things based on that limited community’s feedback, and they “can’t wait to share it with the world.”

Right now, all you can do it go here and claim your username.

We’ve known Beats Music was coming for some time. Back in July, Beats Electronics acquired streaming music service MOG. Although Beats kept MOG operating as its own entity, there’s no doubt that the acquisition hastened the development of Beats Music.

Beats Music enters a crowded field of music streaming services, so naturally it needs a way to stand out in the crowd. We’ve heard that Beats Music will be heavily focused on curation and advanced personalization.

We're #BeatsMusic. What should we call you? #Claimyourname at http://t.co/t6hLMHMzLV. pic.twitter.com/ifyfWT8qcP

— Beats Music (@beatsmusic) December 4, 2013

“We’re talking about real depth of personalization and knowing who I am, who you are, what we’re listening to, what we like, what we’ve listened to before and then offering up music that is highly relevant to our taste profile,” said COO Luke Wood back in October.

Can Beats Music stand out? There’s definitely some excitement swirling around for the new service. It’s taken a while to get here, so hopefully the wait will prove to have been worth it.

Image via Beats Music