[Diamonds & Pearls Music]

When you’re a label as well respected as Diamonds & Pearls, audiences tend to expect a lot from each new platter. Add boldfaced names like Tobias Freund and Efdemin, the pair responsible for the first of D&P’s Phantasma series, and expectations could’ve burst through the ceiling. Yet after “Vol. 1” struggled to satisfy as anticipated (largely down to a surprisingly lackluster Efdemin cut), the Phantasma series took a dip into relative obscurity. To be sure, this was listeners’ loss as “Vol. 2” offered “Choices,” a resplendent Matthew Styles and Dinky collaboration and “Machupichu,” a Pier Bucci joint of nearly equal quality. “Vol. 3,” however, is unlikely to suffer a similar fate with Marcel Dettmann on one side and a Prosumer/Tama Sumo collaboration on the other. As the latter has already evinced in the mix (Panorama Bar 02, to be specific), this is a record many DJs won’t want to leave home without.

For “Helix,” Dettmann spreads a base coat of flushed, waxy tone contoured by gnawing filters which scour the sides and define the track’s rugged shape. His monochrome pattern emphasizes each note’s attack, which varies from sudden and guitar-like to soft and pliable like pastels, leaving plenty of room for skittering counter-rhythms to streak in and out of view. Thoughtful yet unyieldingly direct, “Helix” is standard Dettmann — just how I like him. Prosumer and Tama Sumo’s “Alien Mutts” is similarly brawny and unambiguous in its aims, bulking up the vintage house sound the pair first mined on the Ostgut Ton-released “Play Up/Brothers Sisters.” Dusky pads glow hot beneath unwavering synth patterns and an equally vigorous battery of percussion, pushing dancers to sweat it out as sparing vocals samples are folded into the mix. Even as the melody grows restless and more suitably alien, Prosumer and Tama Sumo have anchored their track as firmly to the dance floor as their A-side companion’s. If you slept on the Phantasma series before, “Vol. 3” is a potent alarm clock.