Here at The Current, we love all music and don't believe it should be judged or criticized. No one artist is better than another and all our kids are above average.

Who are we kidding? It's College Basketball tournament time and there's nothing more fun than judging, criticizing, and arguing about who's gonna be in the final rounds.

So while the Gophers didn't even show up in the brackets this year  and a whole lot of great bands didn't make our cut either  we're giving you the opportunity to determine the outcome in The Currents March Music Madness!

Like the NCAA bracket, we've got 64 bands, but unlike the NCAA,

we're running match-ups every half hour in an online vote-off.

Maybe you've imagined it in your mind, but now you'll get to hear it! The Strokes vs. the White Stripes! The Cure vs. Depeche Mode! The Beastie Boys vs. Outkast! Elvis Costello vs. Talking Heads... living up to the names, the match-ups truly are mad.

The planning was anything but harebrained, however. We started with nearly 200 artists, and pared them down. We even came up with a few categories: '80s College Rock, '90s Alternative, Classic Rock, Indie Rock, Punk, Rap/Hip Hop, Funk/Soul/R&B and Oldies/Original Rockers.

We think it'll be fun, and most important, it's not skill or athletic acumen that are the determining factors  it's your vote that will help declare the winner!

Here's how it works: follow along Tuesday through Friday this week. Starting at 9 a.m. each day, we'll run a new match up every 30 minutes. As each round ends, a new one begins. (You can see the dates and start/stop times on each round in the list below.)

You help crown the champion by reloading the webpage and voting for your favorite band in the current match. Winners will advance to the next round, and the next, and so on and so forth, until we crown The Current's March Music Madness champion Friday at 4:30 p.m.!

It goes without saying, there's no billion dollar prize attached, but you will feel the satisfaction of knowing that you helped a famous artist claim a meaningless title.



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