Ava Moon

After the end of Yes, Downes and Horn resumed working on a second Buggles album, Adventures in Modern Recording, released in 1981. The same year, Downes founded Asia with fellow former Yes member Steve Howe, former King Crimson member John Wetton, and former Emerson, Lake & Palmer drummer Carl Palmer. The weak commercial performance of Adventures in Modern Recording, associated with Downes being busy with Asia and Horn wanting to be focusing on being a record producer, led to the disbanding of The Buggles. Yes subsequently reformed in 1983, without them, but with Horn producing.

In her brief liner essay, Nanci Griffith claims that Ruby's Torch – a collection of torch songs, what else? – is a "dream come true" and something her listeners have requested over the years. Fair enough, but in typical fashion Griffith has put a spin on these nuggets, only two of which are her own compositions (old ones at that). In addition to "Brave Companion of the Road" and "Late Night Grande Hotel," there are three songs by Tom Waits (including his classic "Ruby's Arms," which the album title is adapted from), Jimmy Webb's "If These Walls Could Talk," Sandy Mason's "When I Dream" (the best-known version is by Willie Nelson, but Crystal Gayle's is better), "Bluer Than Blue" by Randy Goodrum (and a hit by Michael Johnson in the '70s), and "Never Be the Sun" by Donagh Long.