Singled Out: The Western Den “I Still Remain”

 

Who: The Western Den

From: Boston, MA

Song: “I Still Remain”

Latest Record: ‘A Light Left On’ , will be releasing soon and “I Still Remain” is the first single off of it.

What about it: ‘I Still Remain’ is about loving someone who is far away from you, either physically or emotionally, and how long you can go without realizing. The song’s first line (I’ll make you light up/You are my brightest star/But you’ve been burning out/I am too late/You’re too far)  compares this distance to witnessing the light of dead stars and gazing at them with awe as they once were, instead of in their current state. It is about the gradual building of a rift between two lovers without any distinct, singular moment that helps them understand how it happened.

And yet, there is still belonging between them past this point of realization for fear of what moving on would look like (Would I sell it all for an old little flame?/Would you call it off to touch skin again?/I have all but a faceless faded frame to recall the reason I still remain). The instrumentation also illustrates this tension, the ebb and flow of self-deception, with the violin and trumpet’s arcing round that never quite aligns and is never fully dissonant either. After a slow climax of inner thoughts interrupting each other to trace the beginning of the end, the song closes with the confident statement, turned insecure question, “I will find you/Will I?”