Pop maverick Robyn on sleaze, snobbery and dating during IVF: ‘When there isn’t as much at stake, sex becomes more fun’

The Swedish musician decided to pursue motherhood alone, and found it came with a surprising sexual awakening – a story she lays out on her new album, her first in eight yearsRobyn sits silently, eyes closed, for what feels like a full minute. “Wow,” she says. “This is really deep” It has been eight years since this elder stateswoman of alt-pop released music. She is talking about how, since then, her life has fractured and reassembled. The 46-year-old Swede’s previous album, Honey, was finished in the afterglow of repairing her engagement to director Max Vitali. Now, she’s no longer in that relationship, she’s raising a three-year-old son, Tyko, whom she had by IVF, on her own, and she has also reckoned with the scars of her own childhood, growing up in an exploitative music industry.We meet in a breezy attic above a recording studio in London to talk about her new album, Sexistential – an ode to letting your guard down and feeling things deeply. “Defending my