sign-ups are open!

The RPM Challenge is simple: record an album in 29 days, just because you can. That’s 10 songs or 35 minutes of original material, written and recorded during the month of February.

RPM is not a contest; it’s a creative challenge. What if every musician you knew put their music first for 29 days? What if every living being who could pick up an instrument spent February exploring their music? What if you recorded the best song of your life? What if you put aside the traditional expectations - that your record has to be a product that can be sold, that it has to be recorded in a studio with all the bells and whistles? What if you could do whatever you wanted? What if you recorded a solo record for the first time? What if you tried a new genre? What if you collaborated with someone you’d never met?

The 2008 RPM Challenge website is live at www.rpmchallenge.com, and more than 300 groups from around the world have already signed up. Last year more than 2,400 bands from all seven continents participated, resulting in the creation of more than 850 new albums. The music produced spanned every genre imaginable — from electronic to experimental, from hip hop to heavy metal — and represented the work of all types of musicians: aspiring stars, working bands, hobbyists, students, veterans, and closet musicians.

Not bad for a project that began as a local Seacoast challenge!