Headless Heroes 'Silence of Love' album

The Silence of Love is a beautiful themed album of covers, dreamt up by a chap named Eddie Bezalel, helped and produced by Hugo Nicolson, who pulled together the songs and a bunch of great musicians (Josh Klinghoffer, Woody Jackson, Joey Waronker, Leo Abrahams and Gus Seyffert) to play on it, all topped off with the voice of one Alela Diane. The record is a simply beautiful collection of lost classics and unearthed gems sung with arresting clarity by Nevada City's emerging new folk star Alela.

The motivation for making the Headless Heroes project was really music for music's sake, a record to be accepted and enjoyed on its own terms, without being an overindulgent or boastful statement. Says Bezalel, “I just wanted to make an album with great musicians and great songs...the rest would work itself out.”

Inspired initially on hearing Terry Durham’s "Crystal Telephone" in a local record store, Bezalel got Nicolson on board, who sifted through his record collection and started to put the musicians together. It was Bezalel who found Alela; he came across her online, and upon hearing her voice, he instantly knew she was the one to carry the tunes.

Alela, whose self-released album, The Pirate’s Gospel, was Rough Trade Shops Album of The Year 2007 and is releasing her highly anticipated Rough Trade debut, To Be Still, this February, was really excited about using her voice in new ways, as well as the fact that the project is not based around her own material. “It was quite liberating to just sing! And not worry about it being my record, or it being different from the type of music that I’m used to making. Describing The Silence of Love as pure fun, she notes, “I was able to use all different parts of my voice, from what I do in my own songs, to what I learned while singing in the school choir.” Says man at the controls Hugo Nicolson, “Alela’s silky voice and Josh Klinghoffer maxed out their abundant talent on this album, along with Woody’s virtuosity, and created what was for me an amazing record to make and a pleasure to be a part of.”

For some, listening to The Silence of Love will be a process of discovery or rediscovery of songs that may otherwise have been lost in time, inspiring deeper delvings back to the original sources. The Headless Heroes’ interpretations, however, are gloriously fresh creations in themselves. All bittersweet and of love and loss, the songs chosen by Nicolson and Bezalel (with a few thrown in by David Holmes) span over 40 years of time -- from Daniel Johnston, The Jesus & Mary Chain and Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds back to Vashti Bunyan, Linda Perhacs and The Gentle Soul.

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Headless Heroes - Silence of Love