wandering in my knickers around the boat, over which the entire contents of my wardrobe seems to have exploded, with a head empty of all thought aside from what to pack for my imminent trip to the Isle Of Mull...Florence & The Machine is warbling in the background and everywhere I go I leave a cloud of shamefully expensive and utterly lovely La Petit Gratin perfume, that makes me feel like an orange tree in full bloom...

I forgot about the simple things. good they are.

riding the night train to Inverness tonight with my mad sisters, apparently there's a bar onboard :)

catch you in the near my dears.

Blues, off on her holidays, over and out xxx

so apparently in a particularly deranged state of sleep-deprivation I managed to book myself and my little sister onto a lastminutedotcom flight to Sardinia.

I know this because I woke up there on thursday.

definitely one of the weirder side-effects I've ever had from insomnia...still beats frustrated hysterical weeping any day!

and you cannae argue with a hefty dose sun, sand, seafood and sleep afterall.

back in town now, patting myself down and examining the fuses on my internal circuit board to survey the current state of damage/repair...

I managed to tackle my inbox today which is definitely an improvement from last week.

I am sickymonster.

taken out mid-week struck down with a vicious case of post-bank holiday burn out crossed with swine flu with added PMT. totally rubbish.

however two days in bed has allowed me to read To Kill A Mockingbird from cover to cover. without a doubt one of the best books I have ever written - can't believe I haven't read it before??

however had a visit from cutie Matt Brindle today and have bought hyacinths which are cheering me up and soon Mr Rush is coming round to take me to the movies and tuck me in so is not all bad.

"ah...the polo mint...it makes my nose feel so fresh and cleeeeeeeaaaaaaan!!!!"



photo by Matthew Brindle

another drop-dead image from the rather brilliant Matthew Brindle. Mentalist fringe jacket by Rachie.

eek!

and today's show n tell is...

Hooligan Night's debut MUSIC VIDEO!!! directed by the wonderful Hugo Levien and starring Trash City baybee!!! :)

photo by the brilliant Matthew Brindle. Giant Pink Guitar by Mutoid Waste Co. costume and glitterbitchin on Guitar by Rachel Freire. hair by Robin Harvey. make-up by Natalie O'Connor. concept/T&A by Blues.

:D

it's funny when you've been riding a bit of a party train for a while (one week n counting now on the white wine express) how the edges of life soon become rather fuzzy...hence the fractured postings, otherwise I'd never remember what I've been up to.

even thursday afternoons rehearsal turned into a bit of a Honky Tonk knees-up round the old joanna and ended up with late night ramblings with the lovely Nik and Emily over Rioja at La Galicia and later still, drunken motorbike rides along the river...

had very bizarre day down the market yesterday. wore my new black and gold star frock I bought at the knock-off market in China. I always considered it rather a nice dress but for some bizarre reason it seemed to have a completely extreme effect on people - I kept getting stopped in the street by people exclaiming: "Great dress!!!...Fierce frock!!!...Oh my God where did you get it...Argh!" even the ice-cool shop assistants in designer vintage Mecca One Of A Kind who normally studiously ignore anyone who isn't an A List celeb, all fell on me as I strolled in the door, going into ecstasies over this really rather normal dress and proceeded to play Barbies with me for the next hour, pulling out designer couture frocks from their Alladins Cave of treasures and making me parade around the shop in them. weird shit. it was all entirely delightful but genuinely baffling. even the Rude Boys had something to say: "That's a niiiiice dress gal!" and I wasn't even wearing shoes at that point. bouyed up by the dress-worship I proceeded to spend my last pennies in the world on gratuitous and unnecessary leather wear, spent a few hours gossiping with the stall holders and bumping into people, before heading to the Porchester for some girl-time with Mouse before heading to the 20th Century Theatre for soundcheck with Aceface and a lovely grand piano.

on arrival I foolishly began to drink on an empty stomach and was delighted to discover that the bar for the night was being run by Emma, Coco, Evi and the rest of the New Cross girls all looking amazing dressed in Prangstas finest finery! the rest of Gus's Speakeasy night was a marvelous affair from start to finish. the theatre is ridiculously beautiful anyway but Gus had done a fine job of turning it into a Prohibition-era den of iniquity. the acts were all wonderful (Kitty Bang Bang doing Fat Sam's Grand Slam was my personal favorite) and loads of people came, including my ma and pa (!) who had the dubious honour of seeing me stumble onto the stage, wearing a kimono, see-thru neglige and feather headress and proceeding to belt out some of the Blue-est Blues songs in my foul-mouthed repertoire, whilst swigging theatrically from a bottle of Gin (eek!). luckily they seemed to rather like it and left with a smile on their faces...

the rest of the evenin was a bit of a blur..there was some high-kicking flapper dancing, noise-making, after-hours jamming around the grand and rather a lot of cocktails. ended up at a party at an amazing recording studio in Holland Park with not one, not two, but three piano maestros all taking turns on the keys, while me and Mouse spun around on wheelie chairs and demanding 'Chopsticks'. me and Joe had a stupid row (Gin innit) and the sun rose before it was time to stagger to my Mum and Dads where Joe had a rendez-vous with my Pa at 9pm to go to a bike show out of town.

the evil devil inside me that woke up in my mums bed at 2pm this afternoon thinks that this is hilarious.

apparently there's one more party to go to tonight under the Westway and then I am in major detox mode next week...I like all this frolicking but it does leave me feeling a bit wonky...I like things on a more even keel these days and knowing it bit more where I'm at in the scheme of things, however I made a deal with myself to have a blow-out this week and that is what I have done.

now where did I leave those threads...?

laters x

this week has mostly been sunkissed and white wine sozzled.

been a bit lazy and been gettin my rocks off on white wine and sunshine to reward myself for finally getting both the Hooligan Night demo, debut video and Guitar shoot in the bag last week! I have mostly been hangin out in parks, on street corners and lounging on deck like a cat. mmmmm...lazin goooood...

walked around Cheslea yesterday in barefeet blissing out on the lilac blossom and suckin on a lolly, then had all my little ghost train buddies round for dinner on deck last night, which was lovely although I was annoyed that I got too pissed to explain the concept behind the vampire show properly which was the ultimate purpose of the meeting: "Yeah...s'gonna be brilliant...an' we is all gonna fly...and killing people...yeah! hic." note to self: must try harder to be convincing creative director in the future.

what else? saw Stah's fab new show on sat and kicked back on Brick Lane on Demelza's market stall...ended up having an accidental and fortuitous meeting, on one particularly sunny afternoon on Portobello, with a certain person who is involved with a certain Global comic book super-group, who was rather taken with the idea of my Giant Pink Guitar and accompanying efforts to transform myself into an all-singing, all-crime fighting comic book superhero and expressed an interest in getting involved in the project, which, needless to say, would be muy exciting if it comes to pass...there have also been one or two hilarious late-night fly-postering sessions around Brick Lane and Shoreditch...just me and Demelza and a bucket of wallpaper paste...makes for a surprisingly entertaining night out actually!

feel a bit fuzzy headed today. too many white wine spritzers. right. cup of tea in the bath then I'm off to rehearse my song for Gus's Speakeasy tomorrow night!

oh. my. God.

Let The Right One In...is this one of the best vampire films ever made??

some of the imagery in it absolutely nails that perfect place between delicate and disturbing...I feel really quite haunted...always a lovely feeling.

dark dreams kids x

so finally, after weeks of waiting, it's countdown to the Giant Pink Guitar photoshoot that I've been building towards all this time and I'm freaking out somewhat, as to date so much to do with my beloved and completely insane prop has been rather fraught, from its conception, to its completion (due to a broken compressor-gun for the most part) to its disastrous non-debut at Shunt...all in all a bit like giving birth. to a giant pink guitar.

O_o

ouch.

I just really need this to go smoothly-ish. oh God I hope the Universe hasn't got any more guitar-shaped practical jokes to play.

fingers crossed kids!!!

hey kids!!!

I've just uploaded the first of the new Hooligan Night tracks to www.myspace.com/hooligannight

check 'em out (esp. Bamboo Hut which is my new favorite thing...warning tho; it hooks like a bastard!)

also we've got a showcase gig at Last Days Of Decadence (also known as Jakey's club) on wed april 29th - do come and play and see how we've grown (mainly in the way of extra heads!)

:D

also re. my last post: "back on it tomorrow"

yeah maybe...or maybe I'll just stay in bed, eat Easter eggs and read Love In A Cold Climate all day.

...and this is one of the many reasons I love to visit my Granny Jane. it's a phrase that inherited from her mother to describe the look of blue blue Irish eyes fringed with dark lashes and is such a beautiful, archaic expression it makes my heart flutter.

just returned from a very Easter-flavored Easter Sunday, visiting Granny Jane in Henley-On-Thames with my two mad sisters. we had Sunday lunch followed by three bags of chocolate Easter eggs, before going to feed the ducklings on the river and then hot-cross-buns for tea. it was too lovely all of us kicking it together although GJ was concerned as always because I look so tired.

"have you been working late again darling?" she asked me. all I could do was nod dumbly and mumble "er...yeah. sort of. a bit. mmmmm..."

I feel thoroughly run over is the truth, but I've had a pretty rocking few days so it's not so surprising!

as some of you will know I've mostly been underground for the last few weeks in a dark basement in Shoreditch, hammering away at the brand new Hooligan Night demo album...reworking old tracks and recording a couple of new ones. it's been pretty trippy doing 8 hour days in the studio, especially as it's been so gloriously sunny outside almost the entire time! however I squared it with myself after I started imagining the Demo as a bulb me and Nik were nurturing, pushing its first green shoots from its dark place in the ground, upwards towards the light...

it was finally completed on Good Friday, two thousand and nine years after the day they killed Jesus Christ, on a full-moon night, in true Hooligan Night dark-as-fuck style! and in true Ruby Blues manic-style literally 5 minutes after the first brand new CD had been 'pinged' out of the toaster (after a month-long labour we gave birth to a bleedin CD!) I had to leg it over to Cordy House to trowel on some slap and wriggle into a purple tiger-print catsuit for a hit-n-run photoshoot and interview for Q magazine (!) it was all very last-minute-dot-com, but the interviewer and photographer were lovely and it was all very relaxed and fun and I thought, really not a bad way to start celebrating on the day you finished mixing your first demo album! after the shoot I grabbed Joe and together we dashed across town to to see the legend that is Peaches play the South Bank Centre - along with the rest of London clubland as it turned out! unexpectedly ended up with a pair of backstage passes after being rescued by my lovely friend Max and were upgraded from our mile-high, mile-away seats to the very front of the stage, where I bumped into one of my favorite gig/trouble-buddies Demelza and spent the rest of the gig pogo-ing away like a loon and watching Peaches fly (yes - Peaches can fly motherfuckers!) afterwards went for Margaritas with Max and hung out with the lovely Stah and Viktoria, before heading to Shoreditch for a party crawl, which mostly involved drinking a hell of a lot of cheap tequila.

woke up the next day still toasted and headed to a mastering studio in Caledonia Rd and spent the next 8 hours in great pain listening to our tracks over and over again at full-volume and regretting the tequila with every fibre of my being.

however at the end of a very long, very hard day we ended up with X1 professionally mastered Demo album and that's worth 1,000 hangovers.

not only this but also had the great honour at the studio of stroking George Harrison's very own stolen guitar and listening to the master-tapes of Stevie Wonder's 'Superstition', Marvin Gay's 'What's Going On?' and a Nirvana track...I forget which...something from In Utero. basically what this meant was we were able to solo each part and listen to the naked vocals, with all the music muted, and hear every breath, every quirk, every little aside at the end of the tape...fucking incredible...there was something so personal about it - like peeping in someones diary...it sent shivers down my spine and Stevie Wonder's vocals were so fucking perfect they almost made me weep.

after 8 hours in the studio, I dragged my hungover arse to TG to participate in Rachie and Lady Lucy's fashion show, for which I was squeezed into transparent flesh-coloured latex spray-on dungarees, had a crown of hair-thorns jammed on my head and had my nipples painted gold (again!) it's all a bit hazy as I was so completely exhausted by that point, but I had a giggle, especially rocking out on stage playing air-guitar with the gorgeous Laurie Hagen when it was our turn to walk and the bleeding-eye bit with Viktoria looked exquisite as well. somehow made it home and managed to squeeze in 5 hours sleep before dragging myself out of bed and heading off to meet my sisters at Paddington this morning.

fuck me I deserve a medal for sheer bloody-minded endurance no or something no??

it's lucky I love everything that I do really cause one day this shits gonna kill me.

right. tea. dinner. bed.

cause tomorrow I'm right back on it.

goodnight kids...hello oblivion!

x

how completely fucking demonic is Twitter??!

why is creepy Vincent Gallo and his creepy face in the new H&M adverts?

Brief Encounter is a wonderful film.

Q magazine has offered me free tickets to the gig of my choice (except Michael Jackson). right now it's a toss-up between Devo and Britney.

too much studio can make your brain melt.

no matter how hard I try I am simply not a vegetable box kind of girl. I am beside myself with trying to figure out how to deal with my ever-expanding heap of rotting organic produce.

as I discovered last night, Lydia Lunch has more Punk in her little finger than the majority of the sorry excuses passing themselves off as Rockstars these days.

that is all.

wowwowWOW

this is the first time in a really long time it seems, that I've had the chance to sit down and had the wherewithal to collect my thoughts in order to write anything comprehensible...

I've been feeling kind of strange lately...a new feeling has taken up residence in my chest and everytime I notice that it's there I get a sense of wonder and surprise, and also of nervousness as the feeling is one that I don't want to lose...it's something close to happy, but maybe more than happy...it's like happiness, giddiness, contentment and a bursting sense of hope all mixed together...it appeared a week after the depressive slump I found myself in post the Weekend Of The Guitar Trashing...I'd been completely miserable and unable to pull my socks (they kept falling down again) until, out of the blue, we had one of the best Hooligan Night gigs we've ever had at an amazing party in a mutated pub/party venue in Shoreditch...I generally find performing an incredibly cathartic experience, but this took it to a whole new level as a week of disappointment and frustration came pouring out, transfiguring itself through the mediums of a Rock N Roll, a rocking outfit and a healthy splash of tequila into a wave of pure performing adrenalin...the next thing I knew I was on top of a DJ booth, howling at the moon with a room full of people just going crazy on our songs and experiencing, once more, the closest thing to pure, undiluted freedom that I've ever known...after the gig, I floated through the party on a pink cloud of post-gig-coital satisfaction, talking to everyone, drinking the bar and riding Joe (in rubber horse mask) around the dancefloor until the sun came up and I padded/staggered back to Cordy House in my stockinged feet.

pretty much since then me and Nik have been doing 9 hour days in our fabulous new studio on Redchurch St, rerecording a selection of our best tracks for our Demo, laying down new vocals, live drums, keyboards and even trumpets, finally after so long managing to recreate our live sound in the sudio. we've also been working on a couple of new tracks (and I think our best to date) and the tracks are sounding 100% more alive and fucking good if I do say so myself...we had a very exciting meeting last thursday with a fabulous producer, who does quite a few big name artists including Bloc Party and VV Brown...it was kind of a big deal as he was the first person in the 'industry' we'd shown our stuff to...I don't know what I was expecting, but his response blew me away and has ended up resulting in some seriously exciting potential things happening for the band in the not-so-distant...I wont say too much yet, but I'm thrilled to the tips of my toes and just wishinghopingwishing right now...for the first time the Big Dream seems almost close.

what else has been happening...I've been so lost in music the last two weeks everything kind of seems a bit of a blur...me and Nik have started communicating in our own weird studio language things have got so weird!...there's been some gloriously sunny spring mornings...there's been some funny gigs at Volupté & TG...some drinking benders with the boys...and some trips to Brighton...some hanging out in the spa with Mouse...walks in the countryside and delectable pub lunches with the ever-delightful Aya...beautiful blossom everywhere...some hot pink lipstick...and toasted Haloumi sandwiches...and a whole load of other things that have been making me feel fluttery with pleasure...

I don't know how long this feeling will last...I'm so scared of the transience of this kind of happiness...but at the same time I'm so grateful just to be riding a wave of it for the time being...


birds flyin high, you know how I feel...

* * *

finally emerging from my post-Guitar-trashing physical meltdown...for some reason I always get ill when I'm unhappy and this, compounded by running myself ragged beforehand, the booze that I knocked back during the aftermath and it being that blasted time of the month, meant that I've been pretty much out of action for the last few days...

...however the Guitar has since been rescued and brought back to the Batcave, the damage has been surveyed and diagnosed as 'nothing that can't be fixed', the hormones are settling and the world restored to rights.

today spent a hilarious day with a rather amazing old fella called 'Tan Tan' who very sweetly agreed as a favor to Nik to lay down some trumpet parts on a couple of Hooligan night tracks. Tan Tan is 70 years old and from Kingston, Jamaica, he was taught to play trumpet by Itlaian nuns at the orphanage where he was brought up and is one of the only people I've ever met who gratuitously says 'fuck' more than I do (although he kept apologising to me for doing so and to God, due to the fact that we were recording in an old Victorian church) to my delight he rocked up to the session rather flustered, having only narrowly escaped being hit over the head with a chair by his irate wife...something to do with the lady who lives next door to which he vehemently protested his innocence! during the session he spun me some stories about some of the people and projects he's worked with and I found my eyes growing wider as he casually name-checked The Beatles Rubber Soul,The Rolling Stones and mother-fuckin' BONEY M without missing a beat. he's just done Lily Allen's album and is about to tour the states with Kitty, Daisy & Lewis and Coldplay and now he's doing Hooligan Night!! he really liked City Calling and shook my hand when he asked me if I wrote the melody and I said I did, which made me blush like a schoolgirl...I'm such a sucker for old men - especially when they can play the trumpet like Miles David and call me 'Princess'!


so excited by new Hooligan Night demo - finally it's starting to sound the way it's sounded in my head all along! tomorrow I'm songwriting with my little sis on one of our new tracks then gonna steam it up at the Porchester Spa...can't bloody wait!!!

lovin feelin music crackling up and down my spine all the time these days, with licks, hooks, lyrics and melodys keeping me up at night. it's funny...5 years ago I didn't even particularly consider myself musical, but now I find my passion and understanding of it growing day by day as well as my confidence with writing it and ability to express my ideas when I'm working alongside other more experienced musicians. how marvelous is the feeling of being able to sit down and write a song! got one in the pipeline that makes me feel quite giddy I'm so pleased with it...

it's about shagging someone in a bamboo hut and that can only be a good thing!

night!

x

been poking on the ninternet and found some funny shit people've been blogging about Hooligan Night:

"A hellish mish mash of Screamning Jay Hawkins and cabaret jazz, Hooligan Night are nothing if not interesting. If you like your beats genre bending and heavy on the bass then these guys are definitely up your street, but if the sight of a man in a dress leaves you a little weirded out then leave well alone."

can't work out if they're talking about me or Orlando??

:D

"Then there was Hooligan Night, whose frontwoman Ruby Blues donned a fabulous blacklight sensitive wig and a dress that threatened to slip below where it was meant to be (note: the best way to avoid accidentally flashing the audience to is intentionally flash the audience; people in the front row got a bit more than they bargained for). Wardrobe issues aside, she tossed around her neon pink locks and frock with a big grin on her face and belted out covers by AC/DC and Ministry in a bluesy voice."

AD/DC covers?! I wish!!

"Next up are sleazy sensations Hooligan Night...these pop veterans take to the stage and deliver instant theatrics. The gloriously named singer Ruby Blues certainly knows how to grab an audiences attention: Dressed in a long blonde wig and layers of false eye lashes prowling around the stage like a stripper on the hustle, the boys (members of Alabama 3 and Stereo MC’S) who back her up do a good job too, like freaky beautiful robots...More performance art than a band, they make you feel like you’ve lost all your money to the ugliest clipper in Soho, and sometimes that feels so good…"

!!!

it appears that Hooligan Night are a band with an amazing ability to confuse the fuck out of people. but at least it's getting people chattering!

in-ter-est-ing.

feelin SO much better today.

right then

I'm going to spend all the money I earned for NOT doing my show last night on that beautiful and entirely frivolous leopard print body suit from Agent Provocateur that I've had my eye on and fuck the lot of them.

there are many ways of addressing the balance. this is one of the best.