Community Picks is a weekly series where artists submit a release to be voted on by members of the Nina community. Once a week, the release with the most votes will receive editorial coverage. This week’s winner is ruby rockstar by RUBY, a woozy and unique guitar-driven beat tape that will delight even the most adventurous headnodder. We sent over some questions to the artist, read our interview with RUBY and listen to ruby rockstar below.

Where are you from?

RUBY: I’m from England originally, but moved to the US as a child, growing up in Washington State.

How would you describe your music to someone who has never heard it?

An amalgamation of textural electronic beats, sound art, and experimental audio fun.

Tell us about your release on Nina.

My release ruby rockstar is a collection of songs made from phone recordings of myself haphazardly playing a roommate’s acoustic guitar. I had been itching to play an acoustic instrument again, having spent the past several years making music with just my laptop, and this was seemingly the answer, though I hadn’t really ever played guitar before the creation of this release. All songs from this release were created from those recordings except for the last track, which is a rework of a song I made when I was 17.

What kind of tools do you use to make music?

I make all of my music on my laptop and work in Ableton Live, sticking solely to arrangement view and using mostly audio clips instead of MIDI, because I like to be able to see the waveforms as I’m moving them around or editing them. I don’t really use any external plug-ins because there are so many ways to break the default tools in Ableton, oftentimes in a way that produces a much more unique result. I think I get more enjoyment out of nearly crashing my laptop than I do loading up a new plugin.

Who are three independent artists you think people should check out?

I’m very lucky to be surrounded by some wonderful independent artists in my life and I think the main ones that come to mind at the moment are: babygh0st, incognitothief, and Cursed Image.