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Jessica Pratt: Here In the Pitch review – retro pop with the feel of a forgotten classic

With her best songs yet, the Californian singer’s fourth album could transform her from fringe act to mainstream success

The 37-year-old Californian’s first three albums – lo-fi collections of acoustic folk dirges with prim, mannered vocals in the mid-century style – could have been feasibly recovered by a crate-digger; one who might have felt suitably spooked by her ghostly, sometimes eerily childlike delivery. And, adding rumbling percussion to offset her super-sweet vocals, the musician pulls her typically enigmatic confections into sharp focus with beautiful, brightly melancholic melodic phrases, creating choruses that are subtle and sophisticated but still memorable enough to feel gratifyingly familiar the next time they come round. But most songs here – especially the magisterial opener Life Is, and the tear-jerkingly triumphant World on a String – possess enough of a pop mindset to transform Pratt from an eccentric, slightly self-indulgent fringe concern to an artist primed to win over anyone.

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