Perth, West Australia-bred and Nashville-based Ruby Boots mounts a commanding impression on her new album Don't Talk About It, her likely introduction to most American listeners and debut for Bloodshot Records.
From the first time I fired up the album back in early January, Ruby's (born Bex Chilcott) record has been a mainstay in my regular rotation and has cemented itself as one of my favorite releases of the year. The album gripped me right out of the gate with one of the most galvanizing opening three-song stretches I've encountered in years from an artist previously foreign to me. There's nary a slouch in the bunch throughout the whole of Don't Talk About It's runtime either, but it's tough to oversell just how arresting the sequence of "It's So Cruel," "Believe in Heaven," and the title track are when you don't know what's coming or once you've lived with the album for twenty full spins.
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| Ruby Boots photo credit: Cal Quinn |
Kudos to Chilcott's songwriting prowess and vocal marksmanship, as well as to her superb backing band The Texas Gentlemen, the collective of studio session wonders who put out their own rousing The Band-indebted brand of crackling, dusted-up, offbeat and southern-fried boogie on last year's winning TX Jelly. The partnership plays like gangbusters across the board, ranging from power-pop-leaning rockers with electric swagger and indelible hooks to soulful ballads primed for heartstring tugs courtesy of Ruby's plentiful reserves of both outsider attitude and sincere vulnerability. Both genuine facets interweave in spades on the likes of "Break My Heart Twice" and the show-stopping, gorgeously sparse "I Am a Woman," a soul-baring portrait of femininity for this very moment centered around little more than faint organ accompaniment and a bravado vocal duet befitting of the plea.
The production, overseen by Beau Bedford (Paul Cauthen) and Ruby and the Texas Gentlemen, is rather astonishing and somehow organic throughout, weaving fabrics of vintage girl group wall of sound, jagged solos and refined pedal steel swoon into a vibrant melting pot of genres that never feels forced. It washes over the slower tempos and bolsters the rockers ("Believe in Heaven," "Infatuation," "It's So Cruel") panache while Ruby soars with fresh-blooded yet old-school charisma and hooky chops of, say, Chrissie Hynde or her longtime hero, Tom Petty.
It all amounts to a damn fine introduction to an artist ready to win over fans of rock and roll that never ages out of style and the more country-minded fans willing to forge their own paths removed from the vanilla, party-country schlock of the day.
Ruby Boots' Don't Talk About It is out now courtesy of Bloodshot Records.
* For readers and fans in the Indianapolis market, Ruby Boots will play The Hi-Fi on two separate occasions in the near future, opening for Nicole Atkins on Thursday, August 9 and, more immediately, in accompaniment to Nikki Lane next week on Thursday, June 7. This pairing is especially fitting given Lane both co-wrote "I'll Make It Through" on Don't Talk About It and lent her vocals to backing the title track. Keep both of these dates on your radar if you're in the 317 vicinity and watch for upcoming local dates nearby if you are reading from elsewhere.
