Saint Motel

Since breaking through with their smash single “My Type,” Saint Motel have brought a certain cinematic sensibility to their music, endlessly luring the audience into a world more charmed and dazzling and glamorous than real life. On The Original Motion Picture Soundtrack—a multi-part project split among three EPs—the Los Angeles-based band expand upon that elegant world-bending, dreaming up their own epic movie in album form. As its songs cycle through stories of love and danger and impossible triumph, The Original Motion Picture Soundtrack emerges as Saint Motel’s most dynamic body of work to date, fantastically escapist yet undeniably charged with tremendous feeling.

The follow-up to their sophomore effort saintmotelevision—a 2016 release featuring the hit single “Move”—The Original Motion Picture Soundtrack embodies an opulent sound true to its ambitious scope. Co-produced by frontman A/J Jackson and Grammy Award-winner Mark Needham (The Killers, Dolly Parton, Chris Isaac), the album continues the Saint Motel custom of joyfully blurring genres, bringing in elements of everything from symphonic pop to big band to ’70s AM soft-rock. In creating that sonic palette, the band approached the recording process with a spirit of playful innovation (e.g., mic’ing up metal furniture and band members’ bodies), even as they embraced more traditional instrumentation (including contributions from several Thai musicians brought in by bassist Dak Lerdamornpong). “We spent a lot of time experimenting with different tones and sounds, and finding those subtle details that give the music an unexpected feeling,” says Jackson. “It was fun to tear everything apart sonically, then put it back together in a way that makes it all feel grandiose.”