Autopoiética is the eighth album by Chilean singer-songwriter Mon Laferte. Released at the end of 2023, this opus consolidates the increasingly important place she occupies in the Spanish-speaking musical space.
Mon Laferte makes refined pop, nourished by cumbia, bolero, trip-hop, bossa nova, salsa and folk. Today a young mother, aged forty (a song is also called “40 y MM”), the lady demonstrates to what extent an artist can enrich her palette through albums.
In Chile, Mon Laferte was revealed by a musical competition such as The Voice. Subsequently, she gave herself an image of a rocker, of a young tattooed woman who rushes through life. She performed with a Mexican heavy metal band. Then, slowly, she let herself be infused with multiple Latin influences, but without losing her personality. At the center of her musical identity is her voice, which leaves no one indifferent, particularly when she sings ballads.
Although she has lived in Mexico for several years, Mon Laferte is adored in Chile, at least in progressive Chile. In 2019, as thousands of Chileans demonstrated against economic inequality, she took advantage of her Latino Grammy victory to reveal her chest, which read: “En Chile, tortura, violan y matan” (In Chile, they torture, they rape and they kill).
The title of the album, Autopoiética, Autopoiesis in English, comes from two Chilean biologists and designates the capacity of a system to regenerate and reinvent itself. This is exactly what Monserrat Bustamante Laferte, his real name, manages to do with his eighth opus.
This album opens with a set of strings and ends with an electronic hubbub. Between the two, we go through multiple musical climates, sometimes soft, sometimes tense and raw, with astonishing changes of rhythm in the same song. It’s a journey through Latin America, enriched by folk-rock and electronic influence, with short instrumental interludes. This disc is designed to be listened to in its entirety.
Mon Laferte manages to combine popularity and intelligence. She has an incredible sense of theatricality on stage and in her videos. Look at the one from the almost rap song NO+SAD. This woman is fully free in a world that is still very patriarchal.
