Fan to Fan

Inside Stella Donnelly’s Music Hiatus: Burnout, Bakeries and Learning to Love Her Craft Again

Fan to Fan

Show Notes

This week we are joined by the delightful Stella Donnelly to discuss not only her gorgeous new album Love & Fortune, but her first new music in three years and what exactly happened during that time off! We get super candid as Stella shares how she recognised her burnout and loss of love for music, how she learned to become a fan again, the book-inspired approach behind her songwriting, and how she’s been making sense of her recent ADHD diagnosis. Plus, we chat about what it's like to work in a cemetery, how her dating history has surprisingly contributed to her brother’s own music projects, and who she thinks is winning the AFL Grand Final next year (a wild answer for a WA gal, tbh)

🎧 Listen along: Follow the Fan to Fan playlist on Spotify and Apple Music!

🎵 Intro/Outro music: Dean Valentino (aka Slowcoaching)

Your hosts: Alex Pearce & Bridget Hustwaite

Catch clips from the show and more on our Instagram!

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

More from Fan to Fan

Jan 29, 2026

It's our first episode for 2026 and we're diving into a Hottest 100 debrief with triple j Unearthed Music Director Claire Mooney! Claire could very well be the biggest Australian music fan you will ever come across, find out how her iPod led her to triple j, how her own relationship with music fandom has evolved throughout her epic career, what a typical day looks like as a music director, what it's like within the walls of triple j in the lead up to the Hottest 100 and heaps more!

Dec 30, 2025

It’s time for our 2025 music year in review! We’re talking favourite songs, albums we had on repeat, and the gigs that made this year unforgettable. Join us as we look back on the highs, the obsessions, and the tracks that soundtracked our 2025 <3 <3

Dec 16, 2025

This week we’re fully fanning out with former AFL player Mitch Brown and getting to know the music that made him!

Dec 9, 2025

A cheeky, chaotic and candid episode for ya this week with Caleb Harper from Spacey Jane! Fresh from performing at Rolling Sets Festival, Caleb joins us at Moose’s for a full debrief on what has been an absolutely massive 2025 for Spacey Jane.

Dec 1, 2025

This week we’re diving into the craft and chaos of building a modern music festival! Joining us is Nick Greco, co-founder of Untitled Group and the juggernaut festival that is Beyond The Valley. Nick takes us from his early days running nightclub events to launching the first BTV with 8,000 people and how it grew into a 40,000-strong cultural force set to celebrate its 10th anniversary. We break down what it really takes to find the right festival site, why understanding your audience and community is everything, and how programming choices and genre curation have evolved as the festival has scaled. Nick also shares how BTV is pushing beyond music (and drinking culture) to create richer experiences, and how working behind the scenes has changed him as a music fan! If you’ve ever wondered what it takes to keep a festival afloat (and thriving) in today’s climate, consider this episode your backstage pass!

See all episodes →