Robyn Turns Chicago’s United Center Into a Glitter-Soaked Confessional as Her Sexistential Tour Makes a Powerful Comeback With Peaches and Dancing on My Own

CHICAGO, IL — Robyn spent nearly two hours at the United Center on Saturday night proving that her music still lands with the same force it always has, even as her life and perspective have changed. Backed by a synth-pop band elevated behind her, the Swedish star worked a center thrust stage in constant motion, leaning into the shimmying performance style that helped make her a pop standout.

That familiar energy was strongest when she reached “Dancing On My Own,” the 2010 anthem that remains one of the defining breakup songs for millennials. Chicago fans met the song with a loud singalong during an a cappella break, prompting Robyn to praise it as the loudest crowd response of the tour so far.

Robyn frames her return as a new chapter after years away

The night carried extra weight because “Sexistential” is Robyn’s first album in eight years and her first tour since 2019. The show played like a comeback built on reflection, with the singer moving from her older hits into material that feels shaped by later-life changes and a more deliberate sense of self.

During the concert, Robyn addressed the emotional distance between her earlier work and where she is now. She said she once felt embarrassed that she seemed to write only sad love songs, then described the crossroads she reached while making her 2018 album “Honey.” After that period, she stepped away for nearly a decade to figure out her next move.

The result is a performance that feels less like a victory lap and more like an artist reclaiming the terms of her own story. That shift gave the old songs fresh meaning without changing what made them resonate in the first place.

A rare personal speech brought the sold-out crowd even closer

One of the evening’s biggest reactions came when Robyn spoke candidly about her life beyond the stage. She said she became a single mother after having her son Tyko via IVF in 2023, then thanked the audience for listening to her music through the years.

The crowd responded with a huge wave of applause, a reminder that Robyn’s audience has stayed with her across multiple eras. From the tender R&B of “Show Me Love” in 1997 to the sharper alt-pop comeback that followed, she has built a career by meeting listeners where they are and then growing with them.

That connection matters in a show like this, where vulnerability is as central as the hooks. Robyn’s speech did not feel like a detour; it felt like part of the set’s larger argument that embarrassment, heartbreak and reinvention can all coexist in pop music.

Peaches set the night’s unapologetic tone as opener

Chicago got a particularly bold opening set from Peaches, who brought a short burst of electro-rap provocation to warm up the crowd. Her performance matched the evening’s themes of desire, defiance and freedom, and it did so with the kind of theatrical brashness she has long made her trademark.

Over roughly 30 minutes, Peaches moved through songs including “F— Your Face,” which she described as being “with consent,” along with “Flip This” and “Boys Wanna Be Her.” The show leaned into her reputation for outrageous staging, with tape, lighting and carefully framed visuals helping shape the spectacle.

Her set worked less as a separate event than as a prelude to Robyn’s own ideas about self-possession. By the time Robyn took the stage, the audience had already been primed for a night about pleasure, confidence and refusing to apologize for either.

Sexistential brings desire, motherhood and self-reclamation into the spotlight

Much of Robyn’s new album revolves around sensuality, womanhood and the complicated process of finding yourself again. Those ideas came through clearly in the concert, which featured most of the songs from “Sexistential” and gave them room to breathe within the larger arc of her career.

“Really Real” hit with particular pop force, while the more restrained “Dopamine” became one of the evening’s visual highlights. Robyn performed it lying down on a rotating section of the stage, which spun her slowly like a carousel and matched the song’s dizzying emotional pull.

The album’s title itself suggests a mix of sex and existential questioning, and the live show embraced both sides of that equation. Rather than presenting reinvention as something polished or tidy, Robyn treated it as messy, human and ongoing.

A spare stage design kept the focus on Robyn herself

The production reinforced that confessional mood by stripping away distractions. There were no large-scale videos, no major props and no segmented acts breaking up the flow. Instead, the stage was designed to keep the audience focused on Robyn’s face, movement and voice.

The most striking visual element was a set of long white curtains that shifted whenever a breeze moved through them. The effect suggested looking through an open window into a private room, as if the audience had been invited inside Robyn’s bedroom while she worked through her thoughts in real time.

She also changed outfits in that same open view, which only added to the sense of exposure. By the end, the staging had done what the music was doing all night: turning self-examination into something communal, elegant and emotionally direct.

The encore brought the show back to Robyn’s signature anthem

Robyn closed with the kind of finale fans would have hoped for. After the main set and an encore that included “Missing U” and “Call Your Girlfriend,” she returned to “Dancing On My Own,” her most famous modern anthem and the song that still defines her place in pop.

As she sang it, glitter fell over the stage, giving the ending the feeling of release after a long stretch of reflection. The song’s final placement made sense within the rest of the night: after all the talk about change, motherhood, loneliness and self-acceptance, it became a moment of reclamation.

For a singer who has spent decades balancing melancholy and motion, the Chicago show suggested that those qualities are not contradictions at all. In Robyn’s hands, they are the same thing.

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