Chica Diabla has arrived and they have come bearing enough gigantic balls of rock to make you forget that only half the band is male.

Have you spent years lamenting the fact that this city doesn’t have a worthy Joan Jett/Runaways/Donnas-style female-fronted rock-and-roll juggernaut to call our very own? Well, lament no more. Chica Diabla has arrived and they have come bearing enough gigantic balls of rock to make you forget that only half the band is male.

The band characterizes itself as being a new-wave punk-rock band, which is just about right. They definitely veer more toward the Sex Pistols and Johnny Thunders end of that spectrum, though, as these songs have more Guns ’N Roses in them than Cars or Go-Gos. It’s bass, guitar, drums, and vocals pegged at 11 all day long.

Vocalist Elizabeth B. leads the charge with enough bite and sass to get kicked out of class in any continuing-education course that she might be pursuing. Drummer Nasty Nats and bassist Rachel Bunz hold down the rhythm, while guitarist Jon Jon St. Patty (now there’s a stage name that I’m sure was available) kind of steals the show with his playbook of cheap tricks straight outta the Rick Nielson handbook. Nowhere is this more apparent than on the raging “Sunset Strip,” which rides an intro riff into hook Armageddon. It’s such a fun track, and one which makes you nostalgic for a time when countless hair-metal acts cruised the strip, but never wrote a song quite this great.

• Artist: Chica Diabla
• Album: Chica Diabla
• Label: Arkhive Records
• Songs: (1) We Are One (2) Queen Bee (3) My World (4) Because Fuck You (5) Nanana (I Do What I Want)/ (6) Missin’ Out (7) Sunset Strip (8) Bat-Shit Crazy (9) Piñata