Clara Mann’s luminous new album, Wishbone, is built on contrast; the brightest passages made legible by shadow, as Mann strove to picture a beautiful life and then to allow herself to want it, with absolute vulnerability. Leaning deliberately into the songwriting tradition, Mann reached for the rough-edged, performance-driven spirit of artists like Fiona Apple and Tom Waits; while keeping faith with an older lineage of plainspoken English balladry. With the folk singer’s instinct for letting air move through a song and trusting a melody to carry without ornament, the songs across the new album resist the costume-drama pieties of revivalism. The ballad here is a living form; a way of telling the truth, at a slight angle. Produced by 4AD resident Fabian Prynn, Mann was also joined by guitarist Kit Mosely, double bassist Marianne Schofield, as well as Owen Spafford on viola, Martin Egidi on cell and Tennessee Woodiel on banjo. The album shimmers without dilution; beautiful and bright with grounding intention, a product of the collaborative approach to the recordings.