Serious SoundCTD: Carl Tatz Design

Album Mixed on PhantomFocus™ System, Lecrea's Gravity, Wins GRAMMY®

- Atlanta's Reach Records purchases PhantomFocus™ System with the goal of upgrading their album releases and garners a 2013 GRAMMY® Award for Lecrea's Gravity, mixed by veteran engineer Carlton Lynn -

Nashville, TN :"The PhantomFocus™ System (PFS) could not have come at a better time," quotes Atlanta's Reach Records founder and CEO, Ben Washer. "This [award for Lacrea's Gravity] is our first GRAMMY® and it is also the first album we mixed on our new PFS™. We owe a big thank you to Carl for showing us a totally new monitoring experience." Proud papa Washer continues, "Most people do not realize how important a mix is to the listener's perception of the music. The PFS™ coupled with Carlton Lynn's talent, helped to raise the quality of our music to new heights."

"I've worked in many, many studios over the years, including the 'cost no object' super studios in Tokyo, London, Paris, L.A. and Nashville, but I never heard the precise imaging, detail and sonic impact that near-fields could deliver until I heard the PhantomFocus™ System (PFS) at Reach Records," states Atlanta-based top-tier mix engineer, Carlton Lynn (Leona Lewis, India.-Arie, Ciara, Pink, Fantasia).

Ben Washer, CEO of the uber-hot independent label, Reach Records, consulted with Carl Tatz for over a year about implementing a PFS™, encouraged by media coverage, reviews and press releases as well as Lynn's urging. Washer indicated that it was taking way too long to mix and no one could figure out the low end in the Reach Records control room.

Fast forward to the present - on his drive back to Nashville after the Reach Records PFS implementation, PFS creator and award winning studio designer, Carl Tatz received an email from Washer who commented, "I spent several hours this morning listening to some CDs I bought. There is a large puddle of drool on the studio desk now. I hope heaven has sound this good. We listened to some of our old mixes and see much room for improvement. We're excited to see how we use the system to upgrade the quality of our releases. My only regret is not doing this earlier."

"It's really fun to know," muses Tatz, "that until the next Atlanta studio implements a PhantomFocus™ System, Reach Records has the best monitoring in the state of Georgia - hands down. Anyone who has a chance to sit in the engineer's chair at Reach will have that fact revealed to them in very short order."



About the PhantomFocus™ System
Carl Tatz Design’s proprietary PhantomFocus™ System monitor tuning protocol offers clients a unique opportunity to have a truly world-class monitoring experience in their room, no matter how modest. All speakers interact with the room they’re in, and the PhantomFocus™ System allows any monitors to perform at maximum accuracy - in any room - with a full 20Hz-to-20KHz frequency response and pinpoint imaging in what some owners have described as a “holographic sweet spot.” It is a new level of sonic accuracy that engenders easier, better and faster mixing that translates well in any environment.

There are approximately fifty steps in the proprietary PhantomFocus™ System implementation protocol, including phase alignment, system damping, speaker decoupling and isolation mounting, careful assessment of engineer/speaker placement relative to primary axial room modes, proprietary laser-calibrated speaker distancing and angle alignments, digitally-controlled crossover points and slopes for pass filtering, and, proprietary, multiband parametric equalization.

Hardware solutions can include monitor stands, concrete, Sorbothane™ and other isolation and damping materials, custom floating plenum mounts, subwoofer systems and custom digital processors. The PhantomFocus™ System evaluation and implementation is a full two-day process and can be applied to near-fields, mid-fields, and large soffit mounted monitors, regardless of manufacturer.

Carl Tatz Design installs the PhantomFocus™ System in existing control rooms and in all studios that are designed and built from the ground up by CTD. The result is like the aural equivalent of HD TV. Once you experience a PhantomFocus™ System , you can’t go back.


Serious Sound

Pictured L-R: Reach Records founder and CEO, Ben Washer, GRAMMY® winner, Lecrae, engineer/producer, Carlton Lynn, and Carl Tatz in the Reach Records control room with the PhantomFocus™ System 4 using Dynaudio M1 professional monitors

Carl Tatz Design: 6666 Brookmont Terrace, Suite 1109, Nashville, TN 37205, 615.354.6242 / carl@carltatzdesign.com