Official rules
How this works
$12,000
$1,000 a month, as a paid gig.
The winner is booked for twelve nights at The Warehouse and paid $1,000 for each one. It is a residency, not a lump sum — twelve paid bookings, scheduled with the winner after the finale.
Over $20,000 in total prizes.
On top of the grand prize, there is over $20,000 in prizes and gifts given away across the season — gear, merch, cash, and opportunities that come up along the way. What is on offer changes from night to night and is announced as it happens, so turning up is worth it whether or not you are playing.
The dates
The competition runs Wednesdays from Wed, Aug 5 through Wed, Oct 7 — ten weeks. The final showdown is the following Wednesday, Wed, Oct 14.
Every deadline on this site, including the daily voting cutoff, runs on Denver time.
Who can enter
Anyone 21 or over who can legally work in the United States. Walk into The Warehouse on a sign-up night and put your name in — no application, no demo, no booking history required.
Staff of Tavern and their immediate families can't compete for the prize.
Getting on the board
The first four weeks are OPEN DECKS nights. You sign up beforehand, names are drawn at random on the night, and whoever is drawn gets twenty minutes. There is no set genre and nothing is assigned to you — get on and play what you are good at.
Everyone who plays gets a profile on this site. That profile is where your people go to vote for you, so the sooner you're on the board, the longer you have to build a base.
Challenges
Once the field is built, challenger nights begin. A competitor may challenge anyone within 10 spots of their own position. Win and you take their spot; lose and you keep yours.
Challenge nights alternate with sign-up nights as the season goes on. The exact running order for each week is posted on the shows page once it's confirmed.
Voting
Anyone can vote. One vote per person per day, and the day rolls over at midnight Denver time — not at midnight where you happen to be.
Voting takes an email address, confirmed once with a six-digit code. That is what keeps one person from voting fifty times. After you've confirmed once, voting is a single tap every day for the rest of the competition.
We don't sell email addresses and we don't send anything beyond your code unless you ask for it.
Votes cast by scripts, bought accounts, or throwaway addresses get removed. We'd rather remove a hundred fake votes than let them decide who wins.
How the winner is decided
The public vote decides the standings you see here. Challenge results move competitors on the ladder. The final showdown on Wed, Oct 14 settles it in the room.
The Warehouse has final say on eligibility, conduct, and anything this page didn't anticipate — this is the first running of the competition, and some of it is being figured out as it goes. Any change to these rules gets posted here with the date it changed.
Conduct
Show up on time, play your set, don't touch anyone else's gear. Harassment of other competitors, staff, or the crowd ends a run immediately.
Questions · ask staff at the venue on any Wednesday.