triple j’s annual Unearthed High competition has officially opened for 2018, giving school-aged musicians the chance to have their voices heard by music-lovers all around the country.

While triple j’s Unearthed program first kicked off back in 1995, Unearthed High is a comparatively young initiative, having begun back in 2008 as a means of finding the best school-aged talent in Australia.

In the years that it’s been running, a number of brilliant names have won the comp, including Tom Ugly, Snakadaktal, Stonefield, ASTA, Japanese Wallpaper, Gretta Ray, and last year’s winner, Arno Faraji. Needless to say, winning this comp is one of the best moves you can make in your burgeoning musical career.

Ducking into the triple j studios this morning, 2017 winner Arno Faraji showcased his brand new tune, ‘Bless (What It’s Like)’, recorded with Aussie icons Remi and Sensible J.

“Don’t make music for anyone else. Just do your own thing,” Arno explained to Breakfast’s Ben & Liam. “Only advice I’d say, if you put everything into it and it’s something that you mess with, you don’t know where it could take you. That’s what I had with ‘destiny’s’. I didn’t know where it would take me, I just felt it in the moment and that’s the most important thing.”

“I was just hurtled into the music world. Now I’m doing festivals, have a bunch of shows. I’ve learned so much, how to hold a crowd,” he continued. “Everything flipped so fast I’m just trying to adjust to it still.”

“Right now I’m a new artist, I’m feeling new, productive, feeling like I can do so much right now and it’s showing in my shows too. I have a bunch of new music I’m playing, trying new things.”

So what do you have to do to become the next Unearthed High winner? Easy, just head over to the Unearthed website, upload your tunes, fill in your school details, and wait and see if you’re one of the finalists announced on August 6th.

The winner of 2018’s Unearthed High comp will head over to the triple j studio to record one of their tracks, and will also score some invaluable guidance from an Aussie music mentor as well. It’s all you need to get yourself on the path to success!

triple j are also bringing their Indigenous Initiative this year too, which means that in addition to being in the run for the grand prize, the best entry from an Indigenous artist will also score themselves a mentorship from the Association of Artist Managers (AAM) along with a school songwriting workshop thanks to the APRA AMCOS Songmakers program.

So if you think you’ve got what it takes, maybe sneak out of assembly early to make sure all your tunes are uploaded to the Unearthed website, and before long you could be charting in the 2018 Hottest 100.

Check out 2018 Unearthed High winner Arno Faraji’s ‘destiny’s’:

The article was originally published on Tone Deaf