Singer-songwriter Diane Birch may be the woman who's going to bring neo-soul stylings back to the U.S. from Britain, where they've temporarily taken up residence. Says Edge of Diane's debut album, "Bible Belt": "It sounds like a lost masterpiece from the late 60s or early 70s, yet at the same time it sounds undeniably like the future . . . it produces the kind of giddy exhilaration that's been missing from music since the debut of Amy Winehouse." Diane's original songs, incorporating her own rainbow of keyboard styles, bear hints of Labelle-era Laura Nyro, Karen Carpenter, New Orleans second-line rhythms, doo-wop harmonies, country-blues guitar, classic AM radio-style melodies -- and more than a little gospel. Diane Birch is the daughter of a preacher and a missionary man, and she grew up in Zimbabwe, South Africa, and Australia before settling in Portland, Oregon as a preteen and embracing goth and other American sounds. Her voice is as amazing as her story and songs, and you've got to hear it to believe it.