Like a balm to soothe the broken heart, Rene Barrow’s bass-baritone vocals evokes memories from the golden age of yesteryear’s crooners. Conjuring up images of Nat King Cole, Bing Crosby, Jim Reeves and more, his dulcet tones can draw you into a world where love still conquers all, where happiness is just around the corner, and where the cynicism of a jaded world is laid to rest. 

Having suffered an existential crisis while training to become a preacher and missionary, his worldview fell apart, his identity was broken, and music was one of the only things that helped to bring him out of his pit of depression.

His 2010 debut album, That’s Life, was a musical memoir of his journey from brokenness to a possible rebirth, recorded while he was still going through some of his darkest moments. Bringing together covers of Rock standards like Dylan’s ‘All Along the Watchtower’, U2’s ‘Sweetest Thing’ and Cohen’s ‘Hallelujah’; Jazz standards like What a Wonderful World, God Bless the Child, and Summertime; and original compositions City Next to the Sea, Crying Over You and Lady, it developed into a Jazz-Rock fusion album that received rave reviews from Bandwidth magazine, and was played on Malaysian national radio stations, SuriaFM and TraxxFM.

Since then, he has focused more on Vintage Pop and Jazz, and has performed at the KK Jazz Festival, JB Arts Festival, Nanjing Jazz Festival, New Years Eve at Singapore’s Goodwood Park Hotel, RTM TV2 PALMA competition, the Malaysian Christmas Open House at Pavilion Shopping Centre, and 5-star hotel weddings internationally.

Having survived depression, and now a devoted family man, the main goal of his music is to make people feel glad to be alive, and to bring happiness and hope to others. And at the moment, the genre which is currently the vehicle of that goal, is Vintage Pop and Jazz.