TAC

TAC — Total Audio Concepts — was manufactured at AMEK's Nottingham facility and functioned as the accessible entry point to the AMEK sound. Where AMEK's Angela and 9098i served the top-tier studio market, TAC's Scorpion and Matchless were designed for the professional studios that couldn't justify the flagship investment.

The Scorpion became one of the most common professional consoles in mid-tier UK recording studios through the 1980s. In 1985 a 16-channel unit cost £4,443 — a fraction of an SSL, but with genuine British console character. For hundreds of studios operating between the project and the major-label tier, the Scorpion was the desk.

TAC disappeared when AMEK was absorbed into the Harman organisation in the late 1990s, but the Scorpion and Matchless defined what mid-level British studio recording sounded like through the decade when British music was at its most commercially productive.