Who said that Americans know nothing of the outside world? From Portland, Oregon comes a quirky, wildly original 12-piece who sing in English, Spanish, French, Japanese, Italian and Croatian, and are engagingly impossible to categorise.

On one level they are a retro-chic, Latin-based, classy easy-listening outfit, specialising in charming and melodic cocktail lounge ballads, but that's just the start. They play enough varied Latin styles to justify their upcoming Royal Festival Hall show at the La Linea festival, but then veer off to anything from brooding European balladry and operatic mood pieces to ragtime or the Far East.

The band is centred around the seductive vocals of China Forbes and the piano work of Harvard graduate Thomas Lauderdale, who originally formed Pink Martini to play at political fund-raisers. They are joined by anything from sweeping strings to a full orchestra with brass and a mass of subtle percussion. If they are this good live they could prove to be one of the discoveries of the year.