* In association with Rolling Stones

* 16 Awards to be given; Shankar-Ehsaan- Loy to get Years of Excellence

* Six bands to perform

MUMBAI: The Jack Daniel's Rock Awards 2010-11, in association with Rolling Stone, will be held on January 20, 2011 at the Hard Rock Caf?© in Mumbai in the presence of India's leading bands, musicians and celebrities.

Among those performing will be The Petri Dish Project, Tough on Tobacco, Split, Something Relevant, Ankur Tewari and the Ghalat Family and Demonic Resurrection.

This is the sixth edition of the Jack Daniel's Rock Awards, and the third time that it would be held in Mumbai.

The response for this year's awards from bands across the country has been encouraging - 280 entries were received for the 16 award categories including Song of the Year, Band of the Year, Album of the Year, Song of the Year (popular choice), Album of the Year ( popular choice), Band of the Year (popular choice), Guitarist of the Year, Bassist of the Year, Drummer of the Year, Keyboardist of the Year, Male Vocalist of the Year, Female Vocalist of the Year, Producer of the Year, Video of the Year and Emerging Artist of the Year.

One of the most important awards of the evening, The Years of Excellence, will be conferred on the acclaimed music trio of Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy, for their contribution to music over the last two decades.

The process of selection of the award nominees began with a pre-selection by editors of Rolling Stone. The list was whittled down to five nominees in each category which was then presented to a nine-member jury consisting of Uday Benegal (Indus Creed), Mahesh Tinaiker (Indus Creed), Palash Krishna Mehrotra (Contributing Editor: Rolling Stone), Amyt Dutta (Skinny Alley/Pink Noise), Rudy Wallang (Soulmate), Nitin Malik (Parikrama), Lalitha Suhasini (Music critic), Bobin James (Rolling Stone) and Luke Kenny (Musician, Actor). The award winners were decided by a combination of weighted jury votes, and popular votes polled on a specially created website.

This 6th Jack Daniel's Rock Awards, 2010-11, has expanded the award footprint to other countries in South Asia. Online polls were conducted in Sri Lanka and Pakistan to determine the best bands in those countries. BreathSpace was judged the Best Band in Sri Lanka and Qayaas as the Best Band in Pakistan. Both winners were flown to India to perform at the nation wide Jack Daniel's Rock Award Winners Tour (featuring previous award winners) that normally heralds the build up to the Awards grand finale in Mumbai.

The tour kicked off with a concert at Hard Rock Caf?©, Bengaluru on 21st October, 2010, featuringThermal and a Quarter and Swarathma(Winner of the Best Band of the year 2010).

It was followed by an evening featuring Sri Lankan award winner BreathSpace and Sridhar/Thayil at Hard Rock Caf?©, Pune, on 18th November.

The Delhi leg of the tour at the Hard Rock Caf?© on the 16th December, 2010, featured Pakistani winner Qayaas, Half Step Down, Eka and a surprise guest in the form of singer-guitarist Rabbi. As always tour was hosted by Luke Kenny, who will emcee the Awards night as well.

Amrit Kiran Singh, VP & Director, Asia Pacific, Brown-Forman Worldwide said, The JD Rock Awards program, initiated by us in 2005, has helped bring Indian Rock Music into the mainstream. Rock music was previously confined to college campuses. Rock is now enjoyed by a large section of the mainstream, than ever before – more bars playing Rock music, more magazines covering Rock music… and even more Bollywood movies on the Rock music theme including Rock On, and now, the Ranbir Kapoor-starrer Rock Star....