Ruby Ann – Running Wild
Rhythm Bomb Records – RBR 5752 [2014]
One More Time – Half past Crazy – You Gotta Pay – Always Gone – Anytime – Have A Heart – Bossman – Same Thing – Heartless Man – Watchdog – Got The Feeling – Run Wild
Oh my soul! With the release of “Running Wild”, Portuguese songstress Ruby Ann has entered the very close club of the great singers (in which she’s in very good company with Deke Dickerson, Big Sandy…). Recorded in Chicago at Hi-Style studio by Alex Hall (who also plays piano) it gathers an impressive cast of musicians: Beau Sample (double bass), Patrick Morrow (drums), Bill Pekara (guitar), Joel Paterson (guitar and harmonica), Eddie Clendening (guitar), Josh Bell (sax) and Sophia Wolff (backing vocals).
It features some well chosen covers and a couple of originals tailor-made for the singer from the pens of Big Sandy, Mark Winchester (Planet Rockers, Brian Setzer) and Ken Mottet.
As Big Sandy puts it in his introduction, this twelve-song effort showcases Ruby Ann’s incredible versatility. Whether it’s a country tinged song or a soulful ballad, a rock’n’roll or a British blues invasion number (Anytime by Riot Squad) she’s always on top. Not only she can sing anything (I’d bet she could sing the phone book and make it sound hot) but she has the rare capacity to make covers that sound as if they had been written specifically for her.
In that, she’s very similar to Marti Brom (another permanent member of the “greats” club) who can easily go from All I Can Do Is Cry to I Go To Sleep without effort.
Highly, highly recommended (and let me add one more highly just for the superbly designed digipack.)
Fred “Virgil” Turgis