James Blake Covers Simon & Garfunkel’s The Sound of Silence

On a BBC Radio 1 residency last night, James Blake revealed a cover of Simon & Garfunkel's "The Sound of Silence" that is so staggeringly beautiful, well-crafted, and yes, sad as hell, that you'll just have to hear it to see what we're talking about.

Blake explained that he recorded the song to help cope with the loss of a friend on New Year's Eve. "One New Year's Eve I had a friend of mine sadly pass away, and previous to that, the things he had been saying to me sounded like an attempt to reach out to people," he said. "I thought that after that happened this seemed to be the only song that could represent how I felt at the time."

Listen to it below.