Interviewing Ruby Bewick: Intimate indie-Folk with heartfelt Honesty
How would you describe your sound and who are your biggest musical influences?
I think I would say my sound varies but overall, I would say folk and indie with a bit of jazzy elements to it as its quite acoustic. My biggest influences, well I’m quite into Eloise, I only discovered her a few years ago but her songwriting is so unique, and she has the nicest singing voice ever. I was very inspired to write my own stuff because of her. Also, Olivia Dean, I hadn’t heard of her until quite recently and her song touching toes was on Instagram which I loved. Some more would be Lianne La Havas and the band BAILEN.
You said you recorded your EP in your bedroom, what was that experience like?
There were definitely challenges in terms of having to figure everything out by myself, I used Logic Pro, which is the most common program, but it can be quite tricky to figure out at first. Honestly, I enjoyed it because it gave me complete power over how the sound came out, I produced it, how many takes I could do, all of that was under my control. I’ve never properly recorded in a studio, I did a few demos with somebody that I met at an open mic night and that was a great experience because it’s nice to have other musicians inputs. In the future I’d love to record in a studio.
So how long did it take you?
To get each song perfect, if I worked on it all day I’d say maybe three days. Of course it varies for each song.
Photo Credits: @zainhayat on instagram
You mentioned North Nineteen as a pub you keep going back to play at, what makes it so special?
It’s the first open mic that I ever did. So, one of my mum’s friends was going there and then she heard that I was getting into music and told me to come down because it’s such a good atmosphere. I just feel like sometimes I’ll do open mics, and I feel like a background thing to the rest of the pub, which can be expected obviously, but at North Nineteen the open mic is the night. Everyone is there to listen to each other and support each other which is such a lovely family atmosphere. It’s also such a small pub that everyone squeezes in, and it makes it feel super busy.
When did you feel like you were starting to 'make your mark'?
I don’t know if I have ‘made a mark’ yet necessarily? One of the songs that I have heard feedback from and seems that it has resonated the most with people is called ‘Heartache’. Lots of my friends and family have listened to that song and they say it’s the best one or the one they listen to the most. The lyrics of that aren’t what I would usually write, they’re more direct, and I think it is the song I am most proud of.
How do you balance being a university student with pursuing music, do you think they interlink?
I definitely think that reading literature as part of my course definitely has an influence on my writing. I guess it has probably improved my writing style quite a bit. I feel like being at uni in itself makes it quite hard to balance writing music and recording and performing. When I am back home and have nothing else to do, then I can really focus on finding gigs and taking time to write songs. At the same time there are lots of music related things going on in Sheffield, I’m part of music culture society so they host lots of gigs with bands. I feel like I am surrounded by music which is very inspiring for me.
Photo Credits: @_tony.visual_ on instagram
Can you tell us any more about the album you are working on?
I’ve kind of just started on it, because for the past few years I haven’t really released any new music properly so something that I do want to do is release more music. My EP that is on Spotify is four songs, so I’d just love to release an album that is eight to ten maybe. I’ve started writing for it, there are probably three songs that I am happy with. For me I can be happy but then I listen to it back and I have to change little things, so it takes me a while to complete writing a song. It hasn’t been recorded yet but hopefully it will be in the future.
If you could play at a festival alongside three other acts, who would you pick?
I mentioned Eloise earlier, I think I would love to play a gig alongside her. She just seems very cool with very chill vibes, and I think our songs are quite similar.
There’s also a band who I really like called The Teskey Brothers, I love their music. I would just love to see them play to be honest.
I mentioned BAILEN earlier which is quite an acoustic sound, even though they are a band it is music similar to what I write. I also love their harmonies.
