On her debut album dear amelia, 20-year-old renforshort narrates an up-close and thrillingly honest journey through the darkest parts of her psyche. A near-lifelong musician who plays guitar, piano, and drums and started touring before she’d graduated high school, the Toronto-bred artist builds an elaborate sonic world around her detailed exploration of mental health, ultimately bringing even the most painful revelations to strangely radiant life. Named an Apple Up Next Artist (Canada), Vevo DSCVR artist, and YouTube Trending Artist on the Rise, ren crystallized the concept for her full-length debut after creating its spellbinding final track, a vocoder-enhanced epic called “amelia.” “Amelia is a part of me,” ren explains. “She’s almost like a support system that you have within yourself, a light in the darkness to pull you out of bad situations—until it all gets to be too much, and you lose her. I always knew this album was going to be about mental health, but once I had that song everything fell into place.” The follow-up to her acclaimed sophomore EP off saint dominique—a 2021 release whose hit single “fall apart” amassed over 6 millions streams. Catch ren live at SXSW!