Premiere: Ruby Friedman Orchestra, ‘Hang Around’

Kevin Bronson on
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There are singers, and then there is Ruby Friedman. The L.A. songstress comes at you like a weather front, a thunder-and-lightning barrage of soul and nerves, capable of wrapping more drama into a phrase than most singers do in their autobiographies. Since we last visited with the flaming-haired diva, her Ruby Friedman Orchestra has completed work on its first EP, “Fugue No. 1,” and she has trotted her A-list band all over town – and beyond, as they recently returned from London where they played a private show at the behest of Iron Maiden’s Bruce Dickinson on a riverboat on the Thames. Friedman has also been working with the estate of songwriter Harry Warren, recording songs from the Oscar-winner’s catalog that date back to the 1920s. [You should hear these.] She’s most explosive, though, when her singular pipes front the Orchestra, which includes drummer Alex Elena (who with Josh Valleau as part of the production team Beethoven worked on the EP), guitarist Adam Zimmon (who’s toured with Shakira and Glen Campbell), bassist Dorian Heartsong (ex-Powerman 5000), trombonist Ulf Bjorlin (Vaud & the Villains) and keyboardist Nick Johns (who’s toured with Ben Lee). For sheer theatricality and execution, there are few better. And for now, Friedman has the distinction of having the best voice of anybody not signed to a big fat record deal, and we can’t imagine that will last very long.

||| Download: “(That’s Why I Let You) Hang Around”

||| Live: The Ruby Friedman Orchestra performs Friday, Sept. 9, at the House of Blues.