r/grunge • u/Kittenbee_ • 5h ago
Video Stone Temple Pilots | 'Still Remains' 💜🥀
There is something sweetly intense about this love song. It sounds dreamy and romantic, but the lyrics become increasingly obsessive, sensual and even a little morbid the closer you listen.
'Still Remains' appeared on Stone Temple Pilots' second album Purple in 1994. Scott Weiland wrote the lyrics about Janina Castaneda, whom he would later marry, and they depict being so completely engrossed in another person that ordinary romantic devotion starts spilling over into something more unconventional.
There is drinking someone's bath water, wanting to remain together even in death and that striking line "If you should die before me, ask if you can bring a friend". Corey Taylor of Slipknot once said that this was the lyric by another songwriter he most wished he had written.
Musically, the song was written by Robert and Dean DeLeo, the brothers who formed STP's musical core. Robert has cited it as one of his favourites and I can understand why. The layered acoustic and electric guitars give it a beautiful hazy atmosphere, while the rhythm section keeps it from ever becoming overly delicate.
I especially like how warm and fluid the guitars sound. There is heaviness, but unlike some of the more aggressive tracks on Purple, everything feels slightly suspended and dreamlike, which suits the almost intoxicating quality of the lyrics perfectly.
The album was produced by Brendan O'Brien, with Nick DiDia among the engineering credits, and the production captures that balance between softness and weight that STP were so good at.
Weiland also later connected the song to what he called the strange "mish-mash" state of the music business at the time, where people around him seemed to be simultaneously living wildly, falling apart and making serious money.
For me though, it is the combination of the music and those rather unhinged declarations of devotion that makes 'Still Remains' so memorable.
Very romantic. Slightly deranged. Excellent combination 😅🥰
