Even in the pro audio world, Crane Song founder Dave Hill is hardly a household name. But starting back in the 1980s, his designs were the driving force behind many of Summit Audio’s most successful studio products, including the EQP-200 Dual Program Equalizer and the DCL-200 Dual Tube Compressor. Later setting out on his own, he founded Crane Song to create pristine-quality electronics for recording, mastering, and live sound engineers.

First shown in 2002, Phoenix was Dave Hill’s first foray into creating plug-ins. A TDM plug-in suite for Pro Tools HD, Phoenix is designed to put analog color into the digital domain by increasing apparent loudness without increasing gain (e.g., by modeling analog tape compression). The five different "flavors" of Phoenix can result in a much more musical sound and can add effects similar to gentle tape saturation — and is ideal for giving digital systems an analog sound — either in the studio or for live front of house or monitor mixing. Phoenix II, a newer version, runs both native and DSP on Avid’s AAX platform.