Diva Destruction Run Cold CD

Diva Destruction: Debra Fogarty (vocals, keyboards).
Recording information: DF's Electrolab.
Hearing the leadoff title track of Diva Destruction's third album Run Cold, one musical comparison is utterly inescapable: despite the arrangements' reliance on pulsating keyboards instead of the familiar post-punk guitar drone, Run Cold is hugely indebted to Siouxsie and the Banshees. Listening to the rest of this appealing albeit shamelessly derivative album, those with musical memories of a certain strain of British post-punk will find plenty of other familiar sounds. "The Fourth Knife," for example, sounds like it could be Section 25's great lost follow-up to "Looking from a Hilltop," "Electric Air" has the theatrical new romantic vibe of vintage Visage, and everywhere, singer/songwriter Debra L. Fogarty sounds surprisingly like Ludus leader Linder Sterling. Put Run Cold in the mix during any dance club's retro '80s night, and no one will believe that it's not a recently unearthed gem from the Factory Benelux label circa 1982. Like those albums, however, this one peters out into uninspired familiarity before the end. Still, the resemblance is uncanny, and that has to be worth something. ~ Stewart Mason