Stella Talpo reveals sumptuous, Latin-inflected alt-R&B jam “Mona”

The lyrics of “Mona”, inspired by Brazilian author Paolo Coelho’s The Alchemist, ruminate on unhatching one's identity. Having been born in Italy and raised in Singapore before settling in South London, it’s a search that has defined Stella Talpo. “The breeze brings the strangest things,” she sings.

“I guess it’s the whole vibe of how much I yearned to go to the ‘real world’ that influences my music,” she says. “This sense of alienation and existentialism that I was imparted with because of this third culture, this very sterilised and separated society that I was trying to form my identity in.”

Talpo’s vocal climbs to unfurl a pleasing chorus before retreating into a cool whisper in a hypnotic mid-section that finds her slipping into her mother tongue. All the forces that flicker in the frame throughout congeal in the track’s outro as a tight R&B beat coils around the spidering Latin-style fretwork to stunning effect.

“It’s our life’s dance with our destinies,” she says. “It’s about divine intervention pushing us towards a destiny that not even we might think we’re capable to pursue. It’s about intuition, pilgrimage, personal transformation, surrender and the art of letting go of what we think our journey should be to give space for our true purpose to reveal itself.”