/MUSIC STILL KICKING AGAINST CONVENTION
IT was back in 2010 that Diane Birch decided she’d be better off, for the sake of her mental well-being, not Googling herself too intensively in future. At the time, the New York-based songstress was readying the release of her Velveteen Age EP, a collection of somewhat surprising cover versions, featuring songs by Joy Division, Echo & the Bunnymen and The Sisters of Mercy. Birch, naturally curious as to what the hardcore fans of those bands thought of her interpretations, went searching for feedback.
“I made the mistake of going onto a Sisters of Mercy fan forum,” she recalls, “and I’d never seen so much negativity in my life! I was like, ‘Note to self: Never do this again.’ The frustrating thing was, goth and punk culture played a huge part in my life. I wasn’t covering those songs to be cool or ironic. Those songs were the soundtrack to my teenage years.”
You can understand why Diane Birch is so hugely defensive of her gothic, punk roots. Raised in a strict religious family - her father, who passed away in 2013, was a Seventh Day Adventist preacher – Michigan-born Birch was forbidden from playing secular music during her childhood, listening only to classical, opera and church music. Then, of course, something called adolescence kicked in and Birch’s teenage rebellion began in earnest as she immersed herself deeper and deeper into music - and ways of thinking - that her parents would have disapproved of.
“I found camaraderie with the goths and punks and street kids,” she reflects. “I guess it was classic teenage rebellion; the more you are shielded from anything that’s dark or secular, the more you end up being drawn to it. So for me, discovering The Cure, Sisters of Mercy and Joy Division was massive.”
Fast forward to the present day and Diane Birch’s music, whilst not particularly gothicsounding, is clearly still drawn to the darkest recesses of the human soul. Her first album, 2009’s Bible Belt, explored that deep conflict between her conservative upbringing and the need to rebel. 2013 follow-up Speak a Little Louder featured one painfully candid song (It Plays On) concerning the death of her father. Birch’s third release, the seven-track mini album Nous, which finally gets a physical release this month (after its initial digital download last year), is surely her most self-examining effort to date, reflecting on themes such as power and gender. Digging so deep emotionally does, however, come at a cost.
“Once an album is done, I’ll be in a ball crying my eyes out,” she half deadpans. “Writing the way I do, you really have to push, reach deep into yourself. Going to such dark places takes a tremendous amount of energy. But there is a great satisfaction once you’re done, because you know you’ve given your all to making the record.”
That Birch has even managed to release her third album, Nous, is testament to her powers of perseverance. She arrived in a flurry of hype at the tail-end of the 2000s, her impassioned, soulexcavating piano ballads drawing comparisons with Carole King, Stevie Nicks and Elton John. Most significantly, she also earned the patronage of the late Prince, who spotted her playing piano in a Beverly Hills bar and promptly invited her back to his house for a jam. “A completely crazy way to spend a random Tuesday night,” she jokes.
Despite huge critical praise for her first two albums, Birch’s frustrations with the music biz forced her to part company with her record label, S-Curve - which explains the three-year gap between albums.
The Diane Birch of 2017 is, she says, a much more “hands-on, DIY operation.” Now self-releasing her music, with her boyfriend helping out with the business side of things, Birch feels like she’s come full circle. The teenage goth girl kicking against convention is still very much in evidence.
“I’m still a bedroom musician, sitting at my piano whining about life,” she laughs. “As a musician, you do live in this bubble, working away, oblivious to the outside world. It’s only when you release albums, or play shows, that you feel that connection; people responding to your music. It’s invigorating.”