HER FAIRY-TALE RISE IS JUST GETTING STARTED
Edmonton student-turned-Vine-star Ruth B continues climbing with her magical, Peter Pan-inspired hit, ‘Lost Boy’
Groggy at the airport in the early hours of Monday morning, Edmonton’s Ruth B received a helpful reminder that her surprise hit tune “Lost Boy” knows no borders.
Hours after performing the twinkling tune on the red carpet of the MMVAs, Ruth (surname: Berhe) was New York-bound when a customs officer inspecting her passport asked the 20-year-old what she did for a living. Eventually, the officer wanted to know if she had any songs he’d recognize and she modestly suggested “Lost Boy.”
“He started singing the words!” she recalled later Monday. “He’s like, ‘Oh my gosh, I love that song!’ And his friend started chiming in too.
“That caught me off guard,” she added. “I (told) him: ‘You’re the best officer I’ve come across so far.’ ”
Well, one imagines much of Ruth B’s jet-setting is yet to come.
Only recently, she was just a student at MacEwan University eyeing a major in political science and playing keyboard in her downtime. Then she felt a random twinge of inspiration after watching an episode of the fantasy soap Once Upon a
Time and she sang this simple melody into her phone: “I am a lost boy from Neverland, usually hanging out with Peter Pan.”
The real fairy tale came next.
Ruth B’s Vine went viral within a week.
She continued building the song in six-second increments, and the eventual completed version of “Lost Boy” became a bona fide (and stillascending) hit, reaching No. 25 on the Billboard Hot 100 and racking up 10.8 million YouTube views.
Berhe now has more than 3.2 million combined Twitter and Vine followers, a record deal with Sony/ Columbia and the adoration of famous fans such as Chloe Grace Moretz.
With her debut full-length nearing completion — she’s eyeing a September release — Ruth B answered a few of our questions with characteristic concision.
The MMVAs must have been one of your first big red carpets. All the yelling photographers snapping you, what was it like? It’s definitely scary and overwhelming, but you just have to get into the headspace and get it done.
It’s definitely a lot different than, like, school photos.
Did you meet anyone exciting? I said hi to Nick Jonas, which was kind of cool; my 11-year-old self was freaking out for sure.
I was hanging out with Alessia (Cara) too, she’s great.
When you were focused on Vine, did you ever come up with a great melody that happened to be seven or eight seconds long? Oh yeah, that used to be stressful. But then you just speed it up until it fits.
You’ve caught a lot of people’s ears with simplicity: often it’s just piano and your voice. Will your new record keep it spare? I think there’s a certain complexity in simplicity. I definitely believe in elevating my sound.
The one thing I want all my songs to have in common is the honesty in the lyrics.
(The new album) sounds a lot like the EP in terms of honesty, but I think sonically, people will be surprised.
Do you think you’ll ever tire of “Lost Boy”? When I hear the song, for me, personally, it’s very evident that it was the first song I wrote.
Any basketball player who watches the first game he played, he’ll know that it was his first game.
I’ll always be thankful for what the song has done for me, but I mean, yeah, once you sing it every day for a year, you do sometimes grow tired of it.
I can’t imagine you’ve managed to keep up with Once Upon a Time? Oh no, I still watch. I’m a little bit behind, but I definitely have it downloaded on my phone, waiting.
Any time I have some spare time, I definitely try and get an episode in.