I’ve been intrigued for some time about how different cultures view their senior citizens. I often wondered what was going through her mind in those countless hours that she appeared to be staring out the windows of the rest home. I didn’t see her very often for most of her life – usually once every 2-3 years when I visited New Zealand from Sydney, where I grew up, and spent most of my life. She spent the last 15 years of her life in a nursing home in Taranaki. The idea for Out Their Windows sparked a few years back while my grandmother was still alive.
Conveyed with aching intensity and a stunning soulful vocal performance, the single is a very personal contemplation on the fate of elderly people in our Western society, being left to age in homes, as Renee tells us in the story of her song below. Staying true to her trusty acoustic guitar and folk-tinged tunes that tell a story, the first release from an upcoming selection of songs, Out Their Windows, shows a more mature side to her songwriting. Previously active as Renny M, Taranaki singer-songwriter Renee Millner decided to create music under her actual name after all, to avoid confusion.
