Jingle and Kattelox: here's what I was kicking around, and please give me your thoughts. Primary goal is to have FUN, and bust some balls (Jingle, I love what you wrote on the intro to yours), so keep that in mind:
I want to do a themed roulette using a NASCAR championship structure. Eight rounds - each round with a theme. After five, the top eight go head to head in the "Chase" (rounds 6, 7, and 8). You win one of the first five rounds, you're automatically in. The remaining spots will be filled by points. Sixth round (with 8 contestants): four go on, four go home. Seventh round (with 4 contestants): two go on, two go home. Eight round (with 2 contestants): one wins, one cries.
I'm toying with scoring each song like this: seven points on whether I like it and three points on how well it fits the theme (with one point of that for creativity). I'm toying with no banned list, and if I reject the song, you can either resubmit a different one, or submit that one and have two points taken off right off the top.
The themes will be more complicated than "Live Song!" or "Epic", but the point isn't to bust chops but have some fun. I'm thinking like a theme like "The Beatles", but sending a McCartney solo song would get two points (unless it was his shittier ones from more recently) but would get zero creativity points. Assuming I didn't know the song (possible) Elton John would get three points, because I love Elton and he played with Lennon live in '74 and they were good friends.
I don't know; like I said, trying to have some fun and avoid the same-old, same-old.