I see what you're trying to do hear, Chad, and I LIKE it.

As long as we all agree that the Rolling Stones are far and away the best band to ever exist, then I will participate

Seriously, this sounds awesomely fun, and I think might re-invigorate the music talk around here, instead of hipinion adn jobboy threads getting 15 pages.

(No offense, Ryan, I'm glad you're employed)

jack johnson vs john mayer

ashlee simpson vs avril lavigne

vanilla ice vs snow

may the controversy RAGE!

That makes a lot of sense, and it ultimately delays the illogical and incomparable mismatches toward later rounds, where you could say those that advance are representing their genre. But is grouping by region/era/style necessarily fair, as we as a group tend have our own biases there also? The debate goes on...

For the record, what I did there was a few examples of what happened if I seeded the top 128 according to the acclaimedmusic list (1 vs. 128, 2 vs. 127, etc.) All the pairings I listed were used with that method. Some of them are extremely comparable. I thought Boss/Can was a funny combo, so I listed it. It's still no Pavement/Grateful Dead, but hey...

Swiateck: Sir, yes, sir!!!!

128 is probably too few, actually, but we want to keep this manageable.

So are we going to establish a cutoff date of 1980 or something? Would that mean no band that debuted before then would be elligible, or would we make exceptions for groups who've released a majority of their material (or what we'd consider their "good" material) afterwards?

Well, I have a problem with organizing this thing like a sports tournament a la No.1 vs. No.128, etc.

It's just too arbitrary, and depending on how we come up with the list of 128, there may be too many ties to effectively quantify things this way.

We would just have to agree to allow someone to moderate the groupings, and trust their judgment to pair them up as logically as possible.

I was gonna use 1969 as the cutoff date (no more Beatles; the Stooges and MC5 records kinda mark the start of punk; post-Woodstock). Thinking is if you debuted before then you're out, but I imagine there's some artistic wiggle room we can allow.

I take the view that setting it up like a tournament will make it more interesting because there's no telling what ridiculous pairings will occur in later rounds. Can vs. Springsteen, Costello vs. Metallica... that's part of the fun from where I sit.

A couple years ago there was a site that had a 64-pairing tourney to decide the best secondary character on The Simpsons. They featured one contest per day with voting and a comment board and it was a riot. I think the back catalog battle could be just as much fun. (Mr. Burns beat Ralph Wiggum in the finals, if anyone's wondering.)

You can trust Colin and I to do this up right. We'll get the field selected next week and go from there.

Please elaborate.

I mean, I know this is your idea and all, but maybe consider making this somewhat democratic.

Don't worry, that's the all-inclusive "we", DC.
Let's take the weekend to talk over how to select the field and next week we can begin in earnest.

Are we still doing this?

God, I'm a dork.

As long as someone does all the work. Is that someone you?

Well, I don't wanna step on anybody's (swiateck's) toes...

but I'll be glad to do something

Sorry for being derelict, but I just got a significant change in job duties (more on that in another thread) and have been in a meeting all morning.

I was thinking it might make the most sense to kick this off just after the new year. I don't want to take anything away from the year-end schmoo poll, plus I hate January and this'll give me something to look forward to. Not to mention people being wrapped up with holiday stuff, my new job stuff, my trying to start a business...

Yeah, January for the tourney. But we can take this month to select the field and Sketch and I can take the proper time to set up good pairings.

I'm glad everyone is so into doing this. It'll be a ball.

Yeah, let's definitely wait for the new year. I'm also keeping my Mix Idea on the low until the new year. One thing at a time I say. The Shmoo Poll should keep us entertained for at least until the end of January, perhaps even February.

Ready when you are, boss.

I can pitch in and help too, if it is needed....