PC: Ruba Say’s Facebook
“We thought he’d outlive us all,” went one of the many comments online after news of the July 16th passing of Columbia musician and iconic personality Ruba Say at the age of 56 (From a chronic medical condition) broke. It was his larger-than-life persona that most locals remember, along with an easygoing attitude that meant he got along with everyone. In my nearly 30 years of writing about local music in Columbia, I can’t recall a time when Ruba wasn’t around, doing something, playing somewhere, sending me demos or sharing news of a new album or show.
Ruba was his own best promoter, and before social media came along he was creative in his efforts to be heard. Former WUSC-FM student DJ Tug Baker recalls his first encounter with Ruba:
“The first interview I ever did at WUSC was with Ruba Say. During one of my first shows freshman year, he burst into the studio during my show and said he was scheduled for an interview about Ruba Say and the Cosmic Rays. No one had told me anything about it, and I was pretty sure he hadn’t asked or cleared it with anyone at the station. But I went ahead and rolled with it, interviewed him, played some of their songs, and we had a good time.”
Ruba also had a habit of turning up in places you’d least expect. Emily Strickland recalls one such night at the Hunter-Gatherer.
“We went to see Hick’ry Hawkins play, and Ruba was there. At some point late in the set Ruba started playing guitar with him, and next thing you know they’ve closed the front door to the pub, Ruba is wailing on guitar, and Hick’ry is standing on a table belting out AC/DC songs. It wasn’t a big crowd, but that’s part of what made it so special–it was just this intimate moment of high energy rock and roll that we all shared–Ruba brought that, and shared it with all of us.”
Naturally, however, it is his fellow musicians who have the best stories about Ruba.
“I remember walking into Group Therapy about 30 years ago to a wall of rock,” says Soul Mites bassist Thom Harman. “There was Ruba, spinning on the floor and tearing up a guitar solo at the same time–that is rock and roll, and he embodied it like few people ever do.”
Artie Joyner of Stardog remembers one particular night out of many spent in Ruba’s company:
“Ruba was legally blind, so I drove him around a lot, and we’d take turns playing our favorite tunes on the car stereo. On the way back from Summerville once, he pulled a joint out of his shoe, we lit it up and jammed to Motley Crue’s “10 Seconds To Love” all the way home.”
Jay Matheson, of the Jam Room recording studio and too many bands to list here, recalls an early 1990s night with Ruba:
“I decided to roll down to Charleston to play bass on a gig with Ruba and his drummer, Brian Kennedy–we were opening for some band at Cumberlands. When we walked on stage to play, 80 or so hippie kids were sitting cross-legged on the floor waiting on some chill, groovy music, so we were wondering what was going to happen. Ruba jumped to the microphone and started screaming out a rocking song with his trusty Crate amplifier cranked wide open. Brian and I looked at each other, shrugged, and started blasting along with him. The crowd was horrified, I don’t think they had any idea what was happening–I was well entertained and drove back to Columbia feeling like the trip was well worth it.”
Keith Woodward, owner of the legendary Columbia store Superior Feet Playhouse, met Ruba at the store one night, around Halloween of 1989.
“We were having a late night happy hour and this new face in town came through, he was a musician, knew all the music, and as everyone was putting on costumes, Ruba put on a Viking helmet, which went with his red hair so well I gifted it to him. He was part of an exodus of Florence musicians who came to Columbia in the 1990s, and he was always one of those who could turn a small thing into something bigger, just through all the people he knew–he was the original social network all on his own.”
Steve Gibson, original co-owner of the legendary Rockafellas, remembers Ruba fondly.
“Ruba was ubiquitous, always around, and always positive,” He says. “There are very few in Columbia who contributed so much, for so long, on the local scene.”
Back in 2017 I reviewed a self-titled Ruba Say and the Cosmic Rays album that had just been released, and this excerpt sums up my own feelings about Ruba and his music, and the loss that we’ve all felt this past week:
“There is a legendary space in the Columbia music scene where Ruba Say exists as a sort of alternate reality rock god everyone knows and loves…Take the first KISS album, throw in some UFO, a little Stooges, and a lot of Alice Cooper, and you've pretty much got the meat of what Ruba does… The result positions the Cosmic Rays as a garage band of the finest order, content with blasting the roof off whatever dive bar they can find.”