Album Review: Lotte Kestner - Best of Requested Cover Songs

There’s this old emo song by The Early November called “I Want to Hear You Sad,” and in listening to the collection of 17 covers by Anna-Lynne Williams, that’s the only expression that comes to mind; however, that is one of the songs she’s covered.

Williams, performing under her Lotte Kestner moniker, is the former frontwoman of the folk/shoegaze outfit Trespassers William. As Kestner, she’s built up a reputation for her ability to cover a song, and make it as heartbreaking as humanly possible—check what she did with Beyonce’s “Halo” if you don’t believe me.

Building on the momentum of her officially released covers album, as well as additional covers she’s put out via her Bandcamp page, this collection serves as a “best of” of songs she covered as part of a massive Kickstarter campaign from a few years ago, where she ended up covering 60 songs as fan requests for people who donated towards her effort.

She recently wrapped up all 60 covers- it takes a long time, I guess, when you have other responsibilities and also sometimes tendonitis. Ranging from the very well known, all the way down to the obscure, Williams is here to break your heart and devastate you with her fragile, somber take on every song she sings.

I mean, some of them lend themselves to being sad already, like the reflective “Don’t Dream (It’s Over)” by Crowded House. While in the hands of Jenn Wasner of Wye Oak, who recently covered the song, who maintains its 80s sensibility and novelty while humanizing it; here, Williams just strips it down to a bare bones version with her and a plaintively plucked acoustic guitar. “Hey now, hey now, don’t dream, it’s over,” she sings, beautifully and delicately, and most importantly, sadly. It’s so sad you guys. You don’t even understand.

Don’t even get me started on her moody, sullen cover of Radiohead’s masterful “How to Disappear Completely.”

So, to be honest, 17 tracks of this is kind of a lot to deal with. And by “a lot to deal with,” I mean, it’s a lot of super sad sounding covers—it’s obviously the kind of collection that you have to be in the “right” frame of mind to listen to, and it’s best to enjoy at night, specifically if you are alone, in your home, and feeling terrible about something.

Structurally, also, 17 tracks is a lot of weight for this collection. It never really buckles under, but it’s front loaded with marquee name covers (Beck, Radiohead, Nick Drake) before getting into the more random and obscure in the middle—before closing with a cover of a song by Gonzo (yes, the Muppet.) Believe me, Williams knows what she’s doing when she covers The Muppets. She totally slayed a version of “The Rainbow Connection” a few years ago.

Covers can be a dangerous business. I can remember when Mark Kozelek did his all Modest Mouse covers album, P4k gave it a shitty rating and said that covering Modest Mouse was like “trying to wrestle a bear” or something. With this collection, there is no serious misstep, and nothing that will make you cringe, thankfully. But they are also very reserved and introspective, so there are no dramatic reimagining. She is just able to magnify just how somber some of these songs, or can be, given the right minimal arrangements.

Playing sadness like an instrument, Williams creates a soundtrack for your life if every moment of your life was filled with an unbearable sense of sorrow. So yes, this is kind of the soundtrack for my life.

 The collection is available now via her Bandcamp page