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ruby is lesley rankine

She began her career as lead singer of London noise band Silverfish and was an early member of Pigface, the loose knit industrial noise super-group withTrent Reznor and Martin Atkins of PIL. She then created her solo project, Ruby.

 

Ruby’s first release was the acclaimed electronic-downtempo-trip hop album "Salt Peter", a classic of the mid '90's alternative & dance music scenes.  The album was recorded entirely digitally-still very innovative at that time. Salt Peter & the follow-up "Short-Staffed at the Gene Pool" were remixed by the likes of Primal Scream, Bench, Peshay, Gilles Peterson, Danny Saber, the Mekons, Mira Calix, Conor Oberst.

 

Among Lesley’s other notable projects, a duet with Tom Jones on a cover of “Kung Fu Fighting” for the Jackie Chan movie “Supercop”, and a Pepsi/Mountain Dew commercial appearance singing "Thank Heaven for Little Girls", directed by Samuel Bayer, which premiered at the ’97 Superbowl.

Ruby toured the US and Europe extensively throughout the 90’s and early 00’s.

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In 2013 Lesley made a long-awaited return with her first new music in over a decade. The sparse, melancholic and hypnotic first salvo from her new collection was the title track “Waiting For Light”, which showcased Rankine’s darkly soft and emotive vocals. The album followed in 2014, independently released, and Lesley is currently working with her brother, Scott Firth (bass player in PIL) on a 25th anniversary reimagining of Salt Peter, with a brand new album set for release next year!

She's also been working again with Pigface, whose 2020 US tour was cancelled because of covid but will hopefully be rescheduled. 2021 is going to be a very busy year!!

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