The absolute best heartbreak songs have one thing in common: They remind you that pain can feel blunt, uncomplicated and raw. On her third solo album, To Rise You Gotta Fall , Nicki Bluhm documents her divorce from husband and former Gramblers bandmate Tim Bluhm. It’s squarely her story, yet Bluhm writes with such straightforward clarity, simplicity and honesty that she achieves musical universality. Her heartbreak is yours. That she creates a gorgeously dusty Memphis soul sound and fills her songs with goosebump-inducing melodies is just a bonus. All the ingredients were in place for To Rise You Gotta Fall to be stunning. Bluhm set up shop in the legendary Sam Phillips Recording studio in Memphis and drafted producer Matt RossSpang. Ryan Adams, who isn’t a stranger to chronicling heartbreak, co-wrote two songs. The album finds Bluhm cycling through the interlocking moments of heartbreak, capturing all the confusion and anger and sadness, sometimes all at once. From sobering realizations (“Don’t you see we can’t go back to dark hotels/ Pretending it’s not slipping away”) in the country ballad “Staring at the Sun” to pure helplessness (on the gripping “You Stopped Loving Me,” Bluhm admits, “I can’t stop loving you”) to minute victories (“Last night I slept in the middle of the bed/ Moved only inches, but it was miles in my head” in the righteous guitar anthem “Battlechain Rose”), the singer-songwriter is laid bare across these 11 songs. If you’ve loved and lost, then this is essential listening.