Naarm/Melbourne-based singer-songwriter Ruby Jones has blown me away with her latest single “Nightwalker.” She’s got one of those voices that stops you in your tracks. It sits somewhere between Florence Welch and Angie McMahon, commanding, compelling. And then she backs it up with this exquisitely crafted song which has rock edge juxtaposed with folk sweetness. It’s really incredible.
“I wrote Nightwalker during Melbourne’s lockdown, when everything felt chaotic and slightly haunted,” Ruby recalled. “I was rewatching Buffy, and the idea of a town built over a hellmouth really stayed with me. It felt like my own community was sitting on something volatile, too. The song uses horror imagery as a metaphor for collective grief and isolation, but at its core, it’s about calling your friends back into the light. I hope it feels freeing and cathartic. It’s about darkness, but it’s not meant to sit in it; it’s meant to move through it. I want people to dance, shake it out, and let loose, and by the end feel like they’ve released something and walked away lighter.”
“Nightwalker” comes from Ruby’s new album Souvenir. It drops on May 6, but you can preorder a copy right now. Expect to hear more new material from that album when Ruby supports Emily Lubitz at Northcote Social Club tomorrow night, March 29.
Image used with permission from This Much Talent