Ruby Timeout::timeout doesn't fire Exception and doesn't return what documented

Your code is correct

require 'timeout'
begin
  complete_results = Timeout.timeout(1) do      
   sleep(2)
  end
rescue Timeout::Error
  puts 'Print me something please'
end

does print out "print me something please".

Try the basic code as above. If that works, you have an issue in platform.search.

The problem is that platform.search is catching the exception that Timeout#timeout throws.

You can get around this by wrapping your inner code in another thread -- YMMV.

begin
  complete_results = Timeout.timeout(4) do
    Thread.new{ results = platform.search(artist, album_name) }.value
  end
rescue Timeout::Error
  puts 'Print me something please'
end