DEBORA’S VOID

“STRANGE LANGUAGE.” Debora Iyall. Columbia. The passing of the late, great San Francisco band Romeo Void is especially lamentable because its sound was one of the most distinctive of any popular rock band this decade: propulsive percussion, melodic lines defined chiefly by a saxophone, and a world-weary perspective from singer Iyall that seemed feminist in all the right ways. In this dismal solo debut, Iyall’s romantic observations just seem maudlin, perhaps because they’ve been placed in musical settings that are plenty moody but without any of the old rhythmic drive. Worse yet, producer and co-writer Pat Irwin has placed her voice in high-tech, hollowed-out, low-key settings that, to work at all, would require her to be a technically accomplished singer--which she isn’t. (Iyall is scheduled to read her verse at the Lhasa Club on Friday).