News: $5000 prize competition

$5K Online Guitar Solo Contest

Enter to win FREE! Monthly and annual prizes…Grand Prize valued at over $5,000 in cash and gear!

Monthly Prizes

- Minimum $100 monthly cash prize*
- Write-up in the InfamousGuitar.com Hall of Fame, highlighting your bio and solo
- National press release promoting your victory, reviewing your guitar solo, and promoting you and/or your band
- Official InfamousGuitar.com winner's t-shirt
- Other cool prizes from our sponsors (when available)
- Entry into the Annual InfamousGuitar.com Online Guitar Solo Contest Finals, where you can win over $5,000 in cash and prizes*

*See rules for specific details

Entry Guidelines

1. All entries must be no longer than 1 minute long
2. Any 6 string guitar or 7 string guitar will qualify, whether electric, steel string, or nylon string
3. Entries must not exceed one minute
4. Entries must be in .mp3 format
5. All work must be original and be first recorded within 30 days of the month the contest is being held, no old recordings
6. All styles are acceptable
7. Recordings must be of good quality, as the winning solo will be promoted online. Poor recordings will receive low ratings in the judging system.
8. No backing tracks or looped music are allowed; the solo must be one guitar only, with no accompaniment.
9. The solo must be played live; no mixing of separate tracks to compile a clean solo. Winning solos will be electronically and manually examined for punch-ins and spliced tracks.
10. No contestant may have more than 3 solos entered in any given month.
11. Once a solo is entered, it may not be un-entered, so be careful when you upload. Don't email us and ask, we won't do it. This is to prevent competitors from "floating" solos out there to hear what people think, then resubmitting over and over. This would create a disadvantage to guitar players who have less time available to continually re-submit solos all day.

Judging

1. Solos will be judged by a combination of a user feedback system and analysis by InfamousGuitar.com staff
2. The top rated 10 solos, as determined by user voting, will be chosen for evaluation. If obvious anomalies, technical problems, or cheating appears in the voting results, InfamousGuitar.com reserves the right to throw out all voting results and choose solos to review based on the staff's preference. If this should happen, a moderator will post the reasons why the decision was made.
3. A total of 50 possible points will be awarded for each solo, with a possible ten points from each category. The categories shall be:

Cleanliness and Technique

How smooth and tight is the playing? Are there obvious mistakes? Is the timing "right"? Are you doing things that are technically amazing or impressive? (That doesn't just mean speed, folks)

Originality

Do you sound identical to Vai, Hendrix, or SRV? Are you using unique and interesting chops?

Recording Quality

Is your recording good enough to promote? Is the dog barking in the background? Does it sound like you're in a bathroom, or underwater? Remember, the main purpose of the contest is t get your guitar solo out there and noticed; guitar players can look past bad recordings and see real talent, but the general public won't want to listen to a poor recording all the way through.

Emotional Response

Does your solo make the listener get all choked up? Get up and dance? Run around naked?

Overall Likeability

Would the listener put your solo on their iPod and listen to it over and over? Is it catchy, fun, or intense to listen to? Would people run around and tell their friends how good it is? Would people pay to hear you play based on your solo.

4. Ties will not be broken. Tying contestants will share prizes and promotional benefits equally.

5. Judges decisions are final. Users may comment respectfully on judges opinions in the forums, but over-the-top complaining will result in removal from the site. NO WHINING!

Contestant Qualifications

This is an amateur contest, meant to help amateur guitar players gain infamy. Professional recording artists are not eligible to compete or win. The threshold for being considered "professional" is having sold, directly or indirectly, more than 10,000 copies of your guitar playing, whether via a solo project, band, or other fashion, in your lifetime. Indie recording artists are welcome to participate, but the "10,000 copies sold" rule will be applied diligently.

Guitarists of any age may compete. If a person under the age of 18 wishes to compete, their parent or legal guardian must first consent to the contest terms and conditions on their behalf.

If a contestant is disqualified, the 2nd place runner up shall be promoted to winner, and receive all prizes and promotional benefits.

A note from the judges...

A complete listing of the rules is available when registering to compete for the contest. However, please continue to check the main contest pages for updates. This site is new, so as we learn more about what works, what doesn't, and what YOU - our contestants want, we will be making changes to the rules.