CULTURE
The Ruth Factor
Spanish sensation and X Factor contestant, Ruth Lorenzo talks to Seamus O’Neill.
Ruth Lorenzo, the first X Factor contestant to come to Dublin after the 2008 live show ended last December has a love for performing in gay venues. With her powerful vocals and sexy Spanish stylings, she brought something different to Dublin’s popular gay Tuedsay nighter, Glitz last month.
“Gay crowds are the best crowds,” she breathlessly told me after the gig. “They are very respectful, very loving and caring. They make you feel like you are beautiful all the time!”
Ruth has her opinion on how certain singers try to attract a gay fanbase. “If you try and conquer the gay vote you don’t really get it,” she says. “The gay public like you for who you are and what you are. If you try to be something to get them to like you it just will not happen.”
“I think that is with every audience not just gay audiences. You have to be true and honest to what you are and who you are or else it won’t work out. But I have to say, if I was seen as a gay icon I would be so happy.”
Ruth explained why she loves playing in gay venues and why so many artists try to embrace the gay community with their music. “I think it is great the way gay people see art and have this special sense.”
However feeling beautiful isn’t something that comes easy to Lorenzo. She declares she hates seeing photos of herself and thinks she looks fat. She cringed when she saw photos of her and X Factor winner Alexandra Burke in bikinis while holidaying in Mauritius.
“I see those pictures and I think Oh God, I am fat! But everyone else sees curves! I just don’t see it.”
However the singer, who came fifth in the //X Factor//, is not a fan of dieting. “If I try to lose weight and get thin it doesn’t even look good on me, so I’ve given up. That’s my excuse, I look ugly when I’m skinny,” she says.
Unlike many singers who come through the reality show system and acquire inflated egos Ruth seems natural and down to earth. While the experience of performing on live TV in front of millions of viewers has clearly stood to her, she still gets self conscious.
“I get really shy. You won’t believe me but it’s true. When there is a lot of people, I think there is so many of them they are not really looking at me.
“But when there is just a few and they are all watching, all of a sudden you feel your bum is bigger and you don’t have enough make up on.”
Ruth who belted out hits such as Purple Rain, Knocking on Heaven’s Door and Always on the stage at Glitz now faces a battle to remain in the public eye.
“I don’t want to be remembered as the Spainish girl from X Factor, I want to be remembered as Ruth Lorenzo,” she says.
Recently she disclosed she has not signed to Simon Cowell’s label but she is in talks with another record company.
She hopes to follow in the successful footsteps of her friend and X Factor winner Alexandra Burke, who Ruth says is currently working on her album in New York and Los Angeles.
If Ruth gets the deal she wants she would like to release an album in Spanish and a rock album in English making a chart showdown between herself and Alexandra a possibility.