South London’s Ruthven is beguiling listeners with his genreless and gregarious sound. Filled next to James Blake and Sampha—whom he has toured with—the vocalist, producer and multi-instrumentalist offers a fully-realised and succinct style that bursts with emotion and cinema, and flaunted his diverse palette with a feature on Overmono’s recent anthemic single “Gem Lingo (ovr now)”.
Having bubbled under the surface for the last few years, Ruthven’s debut album Rough and Ready looks set to be a breakthrough moment for the rising talent. Set to be shared on 25th October via Paul Institute / XL Recordings, the LP will feature prominent singles “Don’t Keep It To Yourself” and “123 Days”, and will be the clearest show of Ruthven’s sonic intentions yet.
Ahead of the album drop, Wonderland asked the polymath to share the tracks that he had On Repeat whilst creating the work.
Listen to the singles so far…
Check out Ruthven’s On Repeat…
Prince – “Erotic City”
This tune is really flipping slickly done. It’s kind of mesmerising, the beat and production of it all. All sorts of stuff on this tune I wouldn’t have usually gone for previous to listening to it. The lyrics cross a line from subtle sexuality into pretty lewd & crass but somehow still feel quite fun and tastefully done – Not sure how Prince has done that with “we can f*** until the dawn”, but it works. This tune was somewhat of a boundary crossing “oh” moment for me. Impromptu hip gyrate inducing.
Peter Gabriel – “Kiss Of Life”
The amount of syncopation on this track is a at times almost overwhelming, but I really love it. The stabby synth patch + in the musical segues + the synth brass in the chorus bring it some cohesion into slightly more traditional songwriting structure. It’s proper maximalist production and plus it’s “World music” innit. You remember when music artists would draw influences from Africa and Asia then label it “World music”? ….Peak. But I loved the vibes I’m not gonna lie. I don’t know if Peter Gabriel actually ever labelled his music that way but this is up there in the upper echelons of that rock/pop/“world music” thing. 100%
Phil Collins – “I Don’t Care Anymore”
Not gonna lie, I got really into this tune after playing GTA V when the game first came out. Just absolutely hit that spot. The kind of linear revolving drum pattern on the toms is magic. Everything else fitting around that feels perfectly tense & edgy yet joyful at the same time. Thats kind of right up my street. I’ve written quite a few songs where I’ve spent time on the lyrics only to find it doesn’t really matter what the song is about cos it makes you feel good.
Randy Crawford – “You Might Need Somebody”
Anyone who knows me musically, knows I love the West coast muzo era. Them same breddahs were playing on SO many hits. This is a perfect example of that. 2 members of the band Toto played on this (they also did a lot of playing on Thriller too). Jeff Pocaro on the drums – OOF. Steve Lukather on the electric guitar – wild. Randy Crawford proper did her thing on this as well. I grew up listening to this song.
Steely Dan – “Kid Charlemagne”
Continuing on the US muso scene here’s Donald Fagen. Proper distinctive songwriting and voice. Walter Becker on guitar. Chuck Rainey on bass (this is some NEXT guy fam). Bernard Purdie (iconic drummer) on the kit. These man are on so much stuff from the golden ages of popular music. From the Clavinet, Rhodes, Purdie’s shuffling, Fagen’s proper cool melodic and rhythmic singing. This is an absolute gem. Eff the haters, Yacht Rock’s time of being mad popular is an incredible, incredible thing to me.
New Musik – “Areas”
I first heard this last year being played pretty loudly in a record store in New York that I came upon by chance. Absolutely bang-on this song. Industrial sounding percussion really delivers. Super ethereal sounding. Pretty heavily delayed and processed vocals with a great delivery and very gentle paddy synths. It’s so good man. It sounds like an obvious influence of mine even though I’d never heard of New Musik before this. So glad I stumbled upon it though. I bought the shit outta that vinyl.
D’Angelo – “Africa”
Part of how I got into Prince was via D’Angelo. Brown Sugar is childhood. Voodoo was a transitional record I soaked up when I was a pre-teen+ in secondary school (It really was Voodoo and Speakerboxxx/The Love Below). The musicianship is extraordinary. I’m a bit of a music history nerd because of this desire I had to pick D’Angelo’s brain and search through his influences. That journey I took brought me to Curtis Mayfield, to Al Green and (very noticeably for my musical journey) to Prince via this song’s sample use of “I Wonder U”.
Outkast – “Spread”
Continaution of the last one really. Felt natural. Bro. This song. I know every word. Ask me to recite the rapping section after “you commited a crime and I’m the victim”. This was GAS for me as a teenager. Whether this was appropriate for me as a kid or not doesn’t matter. It didn’t do me any harm. This tune, Protoype, Vibrate and A Life In The Day + Voodoo pretty much carried me musically through my teenage years. 3 Stacks is just that guy.
Jai Paul – “BTSTU”
It would be disingenuous not to mention Jai in a list of influences. I wasn’t making music (full-stop), before I heard BTSTU. Thats how deep it is. I was a musician and a lover. but This tune, and Jasmine. Opened me up to the possibility of writing and creating music that actually felt like a blend of the massively eclectic collection of music I was consuming. Spooky but mad cool vocal. Melody on point. Sound design is NEXT. To this day man, it holds up. I don’t even know if them lot (Jai & Anup) know the levels. Even though we’re friends and collaborators now. For me to be releasing my own album via Paul Institute /XL Recordings when these tunes are what lured me into music making in the first place is a massive full circle.