Diane Birch’s music has the soul of seventies singer-songwriters. She gracefully embraces this essence in her music and creates genre-fluid songs that consistently maintain a timeless appeal. This, in a nutshell, is Birch’s second release, Speak A Little Louder.
Birch is an immensely gifted singer and pianist. With this ability, she transforms her classic-sounding numbers into wonderfully contemporary ones that have the warm sense of familiarity.
On “Love And War,” Birch’s twangy vocals provide a flavor of country music, in a song that has the musical aesthetics of disco, with melodious piano accents. “Tell Me Tomorrow,” which is driven by achingly melodious pianos, is even more country-leaning with its galloping rhythm and Birch’s utterly heartfelt vocals that are as strong as those of a proud country singer, which Birch is not. But she puts so much heart and soul in her singing, that she very well deserves to be a proud country singer, at least for this song.
Birch’s music sounds best when she just sings and plays the piano, as she does on “It Plays On,” which just has some light “hidden” guitars for additional instrumentation. Both the vocals and the pianos are emotionally intense and mournfully beautiful, with a seventies music vibe.
On other album standouts like “Diamonds In The Dust,” “Lighthouse,” “Superstars,” and the title track, Birch takes a richer and grander rock music approach, where the instrumentation is as powerful and magnificent as her vocals.
“Diamonds In The Dust” has a big classic rock feel, but with a touch of modern synths in the background. On “Lighthouse,” Birch adds an ethereal twist in the form of airy backing vocals. “Superstars,” with its spaciness and wistfulness, conjures up David Bowie’s “Space Oddity,” especially with its lyrics that have Bowie-esque elements of fantasy: “So listen up this one’s for you. Let’s go dance on Mars, we’re superstars tonight. Just give it up, you know what's true. Here behind the bars, we’re superstars tonight…Superstars.” On the album’s best song, its title number, Birch fires on all cylinders, with her vocals stinging like Sinead O’ Connor and comforting like Carole King.
With the combination of her uniquely powerful vocals and skills behind the piano, combined with her pleasant retro singer-songwriter tinged sound, Birch is certainly a unicorn in the realm of indie singer-songwriters; Speak A Little Louder speaks loudly of this!