Up-and-coming R&B singer Saleka has released her new single “Remain” as part of the soundtrack for her father M. Night Shyamalan’s new Universal Pictures film “Old.” The film, loosely based on the graphic novel “Sandcastles” by Pierre Oscar Levy and Frederik Peeters, follows a family stuck on a secluded beach that makes them age rapidly. The soundtrack was released along with the film on July 23.

Said Saleka, “I was given the best prompt in the world – the script for ‘Old.’ My dad told me he wanted it to ultimately be a love song and connected to the tumultuous and beautiful relationship between the main characters. We talked about the metaphor of the ocean that surrounds them and experiencing life in the present. Those images/ideas inspired a lot of the sounds and arcs of the instrumentation and melody. The lyrics start with heartbreak and return

in each hook to a renewed vow of unconditional love – something that hopefully supersedes time.”

True to the film’s concept of accelerated aging, “Remain” moves along rapidly, clocking in at barely over three minutes, although it feels even shorter than that.

The song is a gentle and suspenseful piano ballad that keeps the focus on the Brown-educated singer’s impressive voice. Despite it being only her fifth commercially released song, she has an extremely emotive delivery and makes great use of textural shifts over the melody’s leaps–her voice goes from deep and supported in her lower octaves to hushed and breathy in the higher parts of the chorus. Connecting to the film’s themes, the song focuses on themes of hope and heartbreak, which Saleka sells perfectly with her performance, leaning into the chorus with a subtle melancholy. 

“Remain” is out now on the “Old” Motion Picture Soundtrack.

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Sam Seliger Subscriber

Sam is a journalism intern at Glasse Factory and a Sophomore at Columbia University in the City of New York, where he is pursuing a major in American Studies. Sam is also the Head of American Music for Columbia’s WKCR-FM radio station, where he hosts two weekly shows. He previously served as co-Editor-in-Chief of Pressing the Future.

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Sam Seliger Subscriber

Sam is a journalism intern at Glasse Factory and a Sophomore at Columbia University in the City of New York, where he is pursuing a major in American Studies. Sam is also the Head of American Music for Columbia’s WKCR-FM radio station, where he hosts two weekly shows. He previously served as co-Editor-in-Chief of Pressing the Future.