As they reboot the classic Buffalo Stance, the friends talk sisterhood, being Swedish and fighting the system

As two of pop’s most innovative stars convene on Zoom – Neneh Cherry in bed in London, Robyn at home in Stockholm – it’s telling that they spend most of their conversation celebrating their collaborators and creative communities.

Thirty-three years since Cherry emerged from the punk underground into the pop mainstream with Buffalo Stance, Robyn (alongside the producer Dev Hynes and the Swedish rapper Mapei) has covered that timelessly bolshie hit for a new covers collection celebrating Cherry’s first three albums. What may appear to be a pop year zero, says Cherry, was simply a threshold in an ongoing continuity that started in her native Sweden’s collectivist spirit, grew through New York City’s burgeoning rap scene and London punk and street style, and, ultimately, swept a preteen Robyn into its orbit.