Robin Miriam Carlsson was born in Stockholm in 1979. She spent the first seven years of her life touring with her director father and actress mother in their theatre company. At 13 she was discovered by Swedish pop singer Meja when singing a sad, self-written song about her parents' divorce in a school workshop and was immediately signed to BMG. A debut album of R&B-influenced pop in 1995 saw her paired with future Britney-hitwrangler Max Martin, and the success of the sweet, soulful single 'Show Me Love' in 1997 cemented Robyn as an international pop star. Shellshocked by the lack of artistic control offered by her label, however, Robyn migrated to Jive records for her third album, but felt disillusioned by their attempt to ship her to America to be shoehorned into the pre-fabricated Xtina template that was omnipotent in 2002.
"The third record I made was a big compromise," she says. "Once you make the record and you give it to the record company, it's not your record anymore! And I hated that situation."
In 2003, Robyn returned home defeated. Upon returning, she stumbled across a new CD by a local brother-sister duo. 'Deep Cuts,'was a passionate, hallucinatory reading of pop music carved from geometric blocks of pure texture. Karin Dreijer Andersson and Olof Dreijer called themselves The Knife, and with 'Deep Cuts' they had sketched a blueprint for abstract future pop. "I was amazed by it," gasps Robyn. "I felt like this is really what I've always been looking for - and not only was it good, it was Swedish."
Robyn approached Karin and Olof to work on a single. The result was 'Who's That Girl'. Strapping herself into the very heart of The Knife's towering, architectural synthpop, Robyn emptied her frustration, insecurity and desperation. 'Who's That Girl's loaded despair resonates powerfully with anyone - any girl - left beaten by the capriciousness of gender or image politics. In the song, Robyn soars. Unbelievably, her label hated it.
"They just thought it was weird," sighs Robyn. "They didn't consider it pop music, which is crazy. Modern, inventive music - that's what pop music should be."
Exasperated, Robyn looked to how her new comrades Karin and Olof self-financed and released their work. In a completely unprecedented move for a mainstream pop artist, Robyn bought herself off her label. Six months later, Robyn was CEO and founder of Konichiwa Records. In her back pocket she had 'Who's That Girl', the opening song for a new album that would be her story. She also had a new sidekick - Klas Åhlund, the man behind Teddybears, Stockholm's bricolage pop group who have been fronted by Annie and Neneh Cherry, Iggy Pop and Mad Cobra.
The first thing Klas brought to the table was a song depicting intense unrequited love, that Robyn would colour in with every kind of craving. In 'Be Mine!,' every word that Robyn sings sounds like it's being crumpled up and clutched to her chest.
'Konichiwa Bitches' is Robyn's signature tune. Over pixellated hip-pop beats, Robyn unloads like a manga Missy Elliott. Robyn describes it as "a concentrate of attitude. It's like a baby ninja! Like dangerous but really small and cute!"
'Robyn', in some ways, is emblematic of a move towards a more autonomous industry, with artists working creatively in egalitarian partnerships rather than at the behest of a major corporation.
"I think it's the future," Robyn enthuses. "I don't think you're gonna have big record companies in five years. They have not adapted to this new world where people download music or don't buy stuff that they don't like."
