Thepublicrecord.com

Thepublicrecord.com (TPR) is the brainchild of producer Scott Humphrey that went live on October 5, 2009 with Tommy Lee's interactive project album titled A Public Disservice Announcement. Initially based out of The Atrium; Tommy Lee's home studio in Calabasas, California, it is now hosted from Hollywood, CA. It is an interactive website where fans, musicians or anyone who has an audio or visual concept and the means to record to digital format can come to participate with like minded artists/musicians. Users then can interact amongst themselves or with major artists who offer up their creative works in the form of stems; the industries term for components of a mix/song such as a drum part, a guitar part, a bass part, etc.

Members download the raw tracks (stems), plug it into their DAW or capable mobile app and record their parts. They then submit parts by uploading them onto the public record (TPR) servers in mp3 format @ 128kps utilizing one featured mixed track and the component solo formats.

TPR touts itself as being the first large scale truly interactive website where the public can interact with artists via audio/visual formats and vice versa - serving as a host and bridge to both. Some of the most prominent names in the business frequent the site observing submissions and searching for talent.

TPR is a work in progress and the site goes through continual development, upgrades and changes often addressing the concerns of its members and artists alike. 1.0 was open to anyone who came onto the site, had the means to record to a digital format and an internet connection. In TPR 2.0, individual member profile pages were brought into existence on the site. Signing up is free, and at present so is participation. Each submission that a member wishes to have considered requires them to electronically sign an agreement which covers copyrights and employment since each participant is considered an employee for hire with the possibility of being asked to do more in promoting the site as well as themselves. In most cases, participation is considered for charitable causes. However, there have been instances where a member is contacted and offered more, such as a percentage of copyright in a recording contract for their submission(s) or artistic contribution(s).

This was the case in the first featured release from A Public Disservice Announcement; The Fight Song, when TPR member Marcus Davis from AZ was asked to sign a contract for his vocal and lyric contributions on the verses, the outro vocal and one chorus. The contract is said to have shared one quarter copyright credit with the other contributors; those included Tommy Lee, Chad Kroger, and Clint Lowery.

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