Watch the finalists' full sets

In early 1988 Canterbury Council and the Canterbury Police Blue Light Disco Committee approached Belmore Boys High School to consider projects to provide entertainment for the youth of the area.

The idea of a band competition was floated and Alan Smith from Belmore Boys High said the school could provide equipment but the competition would need to be school based.

This was agreed to and the first "Canterbury Municipal Inter School Youth Rock Band Competition" was underway.

The competition initially drew competitors from the local municipality but this was soon expanded to the NSW Department of Education & Training (DET) Met East Region, then to the entire Sydney Metropolitan area (Met East, Met North, Met South and Met West) and finally in the 90's invitations were sent to all schools in NSW. The response was overwhelming and it was at this time the name become one word - YOUTHROCK.

By 1998 highly successful bands were beginning to emerge (most notably silverchair) and this success has continued to date with many bands securing recording contracts.

Last year two of the more successful acts were Hayley Warner, lead singer of Bleached Academy (Youthrock 2008 winners) and Short Stack (2006 3rd place winners).

In 2009 Hayley achieved national and international success via Australian Idol - coming in second. Since then Hayley has performed on the steps of Parliament House at the 2010 Australia Day concert and her debut hit Good Day has been released through Sony-BMG. In 2010 Hayley is set to host a documentary in Antarctica for the TEN Network.

Short Stack have had enormous success with Top 10 singles Sway Sway Baby and Sweet December and their album Stack is the New Black reached Number 1 on the ARIA chart.

Some successful artists to emerge from YOUTHROCK:

Silverchair - Newcastle High
Alex Lloyd - Balmain High
Skulker - Cheltenham Girls
Papa Lips - Balmain High
Dora D - Wiley Park Girls
Exploding Daisies - Maroubra High
Wench - Robert Townson High
Leaf - Moruya High
Purple Valiants - Belmore Boys High
Meaneither - Sefton High