My own first experience of Phantogram only came earlier this year when they opened for Muse on their Drones arena tour. You’d struggle to think of a more challenging audience than that, to be perfectly frank. The 360 stage doesn’t exactly lend itself to giving a band the time and space they need to wow an audience. On top of that, Muse fans themselves have never been the most accepting of support acts. Just ask The Big Pink. So it’s to their credit that they left enough of an impression on me for me to go and dig out Eyelid Movies and Voices and eagerly await the third album.

What made them so appealing, especially on a night when I was subjected to riffs on a gargantuan level, was that they actually managed to blend styles in a way that actually seemed appealing. Too often bands dabble in a genre but never really grasp what it takes to make it work and that’s not an accusation you can aim at Phantogram. That’s what made their first two albums work so well. They blended those genres, mixed in the guitars, synths and vocals that cut through you, and left one hell of an impression.

Then came the offers to collaborate with artists; a result of their mastery of creating songs from those first two albums. Big Boi and Miley Cyrus came knocking and that must have been flattering. Whether any of this would have any sort of effect on the quality of Three remained to be seen. The pure strength of lead single ‘You Don’t Get Me High Anymore’, arguably their finest moment to date, only served to heighten expectations. There’s a clear acknowledgement that if they get this right, they could be properly massive by the time album four comes around.

There’s something about the ambition they put forward here that’s mightily impressive but it’s also probably what renders the album something of a disappointment when you consider those expectations. On ‘Run Run Blood’, Barthel sings: “It’s bigger than life, it’s bigger than love, it’s bigger than us, it’s bigger than all.” It’s a set of lyrics that sounds like something White Lies would’ve dropped on us when they were showing a bit of leg to the stadiums. It sounds like ambition and scope for the sake of it and, as such, it falls down.

That’s not to say the Phantogram charm isn’t there whatsoever. This is only a disappointment if you consider it from their own lofty standards. Plus, I’d consider it likely that the album would be received well by someone who is approaching them for the very first time. That’s likely to be a big part of their target audience here.

‘Same Old Blues’ manages to be a stand out (though admittedly remaining in the shadow of that single). A carefully ponderous bridge is replaced by a punching chorus and it features the sort of handclap drum beat every band (okay, most bands) needs to indulge in if you’re going to really aim for a big audience.

But the problem remains that a lot of the hooks on the record are drowned in waves of production. Three feels like a record designed to make you move, rather than move you. And that’s a commendable achievement in itself but, in the same breath, it feels like Phantogram can achieve both if they’re at the height of their game.