Across techno spectrum

Eric Prydz mixes the anthemic with fringes of his catalog in a lengthy set at Create.

There might not be a more shape-shifting dance music producer today than Eric Prydz.

The Swede (and recent L.A. transplant) first earned major notice in the mid2000s as a collaborator with Swedish House Mafia, with one world-obliterating solo pop hit to his name — the Steve Winwood sampling, aerobics-video spoofing “Call on Me.” Had he stuck to that path, he might have become an EDM stadium titan — or flamed out. Instead, he made a pivot into underground techno, washy ambience and hard house sounds, while keeping his knack for crowd-friendly pacing. Under his own name and aliases, he’s done perhaps one of the hardest jobs in music recently: credibly build a second act that straddles the line between Electric Daisy Carnival’s populist blowouts (where he performed last month) and the f lintier tastes of oldguard Ibiza lifers.

That was evident at his Wednesday set at Create.

Over the course of a long set, he toyed with Create’s crowd, staying just anthemic enough to keep the crowd enthused while slipping in difficult cuts from the fringes of his catalog.

It’s important to stress how little Prydz’s early career relates to what he’s up to now. As Swedish House Mafia retires its high-octane, high-fructose EDMpop, Prydz long ago lapped that trio in pursuit of moods across the techno spectrum. At Create, he dropped buzzing sawtooth house workouts such as “Power Drive” from his Pryda project in between meditative stretches of atmosphere.

His own remix of Depeche Mode’s “Personal Jesus” drew a through-line to “On Off,” a broody but propulsive cut from his Detroit techno-inclined Cirez D alias mashed with Green Velvet and Harvard Bass’ “Lazer Beams.” Contemporary American EDM can feel like it crawled out of the ocean with no knowledge of anything before Daft Punk’s “Discovery,” but Prydz’s connections proved that modern tools and a sense of history only complement each other.