Tracey Thorn: Love and Its Opposite

If Tracey Thorn's last solo album, 2007's Out of the Woods, saw her stepping out on the dancefloor, its follow-up finds her nestled on the sofa, watching daytime soap operas and devouring chick-lit. Her lyrics leave no romantic cliche unexplored, travelling from commitment issues (Long White Dress) to marital breakdown (Oh! the Divorces), via the tragedy of dating again (Singles Bar), the horror of realising that your teenager wears your frocks better than you do (Hormones), and the recurring stagnation of long-term relationships (Swimming). The music, too, is the stuff of romcom soundtracks: acoustic in mood, gently pulsing, shot with silvery strings, occasionally stumbling into schmaltz. Sounds awful? Well, no, because Thorn's voice, rich and smooth as the most expensive chocolate truffle, brings each story to genuine life and invests it with heart-snagging emotion. Even so, the album's high point is a curveball: a duet with Jens Lekman, covering Lee Hazlewood's Come on Home to Me, that is chilling in its desolation.