As in REN – Aissance

Bittersweet Symphony / 11 million + views / An anthem of sorts

Like a lot of people, a hundred million on YouTube, I have seen the “Hi Ren” video my share of times. (See below for the YouTube link). A strange video where a young man in a nightgown worn by institutional patients is wheeled into a green room by an assistant where two lights constantly flicker and go on-and-off. The assistant turns the wheel chair and the man in it wearing his nightgown and holding a guitar. The assistant leaves and as he passes us we can see he is wearing a weird pig mask. The next few minutes Ren, the young man in the wheel chair raps to us about his condition. There is little question that there is power in his message and delivery of it. As the world has since recognized.

Somewhat forgot about Ren since I hadn’t watched anything of his since the Hi Ren video. I knew he had severe health problems and was constantly attempting to work them out and escape from these problems. To me, he was an incredibly brave person. First of all, he has escaped the poverty of Wales. Yet he cannot escape his artistic vision which – in my opinion equals and pushes beyond Bowie in experimentation and uniqueness and surprise as an artist. Comparisons to Dylan are not far off in my ming. In fact, it is hard to come up with an artist today with the depth, passion, delivery, words of Ren. And the pain of his diagnosed Lime disease and other diseases. Whose idea is it up there to give diseases to our greatest artists?

Hi Ren Video / Millions of Views / A Coming Out On His Medial Challenges

Anyone who gets briefly involved in Ren material on the Internet will understand that there;s a lot of it out there. His appeal is cross genres of music – punk, rock, psychedelic, rap – among others. Yet he is also a creative performer as evidenced on many of his songs. Bittersweet Symphony is one of them,

I just started to get back into his music after listening to Bittersweet Symphony I found a piece I couldn’t stop looking at in a documentary film that Ren and his close friend Webby made. The insight into the process behind their developing method is amazing. A powerful, film. So truthful about life and creating art.