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1. She’s ready to talk about her abusive relationship with Shia LaBeouf

In December 2020, twigs filed a lawsuit against her ex-boyfriend, the actor Shia LaBeouf, accusing him of sexual battery, assault and infliction of emotional distress. She tells Louis that she wants to talk about the abuse and its effect on her, “because it is something in society that’s a really big problem and it’s really common, but for some reason we don’t talk about it.”

The pair met in 2019, on the set of the movie Honey Boy. “[There is] an intense honeymoon period at the beginning, which is a signifier of how brilliant things can be. It sets the benchmark for if you behave well,” she says. “And if you fulfil all of the requirements and meet the rules, and all these things of the abuser, it can… be great.” She says that after that period Shia began to exert control over her. “The grooming, the pushing of your emotional and spiritual boundaries.” She says Shia would become jealous if she spoke to anyone else, “Being nice to a waiter, or being polite to somebody, that could be seen as me flirting or wanting to engage in some sort of relationship with somebody else, when I'm literally just ordering pasta… I was told that I knew what he was like and if I loved him, I wouldn’t look men in the eye. That was my reality for a good four months.”

2. She’s speaking out for her future self

FKA twigs says that as well as speaking about her abuse to help other people in the same situation, she’s also thinking of her future self and her possible children. “All I can do is just think about myself when I’m 50 years old [and] I’ve got kids, I think about what I want to have stood for,” she says. “This is something that was completely unexpected. I never thought something like this would happen to me… When I’m older, if I have a daughter, I want to be able to say, ‘This thing happened to me. And I dealt with it.’” She adds, “It’s a big thing to heal publicly and have to do it in front of everyone, but I can do it. I’m a big girl and I can do it.”

3. Shia made her feel like she was “the worst person ever"

FKA twigs says that one of the ways Shia exerted his control over her was to count the number of times she kissed him per day. “I had a quota I had to meet, that would change,” she says. “It was like touches or looks or kisses… His previous partner apparently met this number very well, so I was inadequate compared to a previous partner of his. And I had to get the touches and the kisses correct. But I never… knew what the number exactly was.” If she didn’t hit the quota, “he would start an argument with me, berate me for hours, make me feel like the worst person ever.” He so convinced her that she was a terrible girlfriend that she would ring ex-partners to ask if she was horrible.

4. She wants to raise awareness about how much work has to be done to recover

FKA twigs says that Shia would wake her up in the middle of the night, “to accuse me of all sorts of things. He accused me of staring at the ceiling and thinking about ways to leave him... Accused me of not wanting to be with him. Accused me of wanting to be with somebody else. It would be always… between like four and seven in the morning.” She says throughout lockdown she has been, “trying not to wake up between three and seven [am] in a panic attack. I am there now, just, but for a long time anything that woke me up in the night, even if it was just my dog or a noise outside or needing to go to the bathroom, it would trigger an intense panic attack, because I was left with PTSD.” She reiterates wanting to talk about this because, “I don’t think we really talk about, as a society, the healing of leaving and how much work then has to be done to recover and get back to the person you were before.”

5. She’s had enough of the ‘why didn’t you leave?’ discussion

“That, ‘Why didn’t you leave?’ conversation is something I really want to tackle,” says twigs. “People often ask the victim or survivor, ‘Why didn’t you leave?’ instead of asking the abuser, ‘Why are you holding someone hostage through abusive behaviour?’ It’s a fair question for you to ask me, but it puts a lot on me. It puts a lot on victims and survivors.” She says that leaving, “genuinely felt impossible. I felt so controlled and I felt so confused and I felt so low, beneath myself, that the fear of leaving and knowing I had all this work to do to get back to just feeling OK, it was completely overwhelming.”

6. She began the process of leaving Shia following a phone call to a helpline for abused women

FKA twigs talks about an “incident, driving back from the desert, where he was threatening to crash the car unless I said I loved him, and he ended up basically strangling me at a gas station. And nobody did anything. That was a really low moment for me, because I felt like I would never be believed.” She says that was the day that she called a helpline for abused women. “Her reaction to me was so serious… Somebody was taking this so seriously and wants to get me somewhere safe. That was a really massive wake-up call. That’s the time when I realised that I need a lot of help to get out of this.” She says it was at this point that she started telling friends and started speaking to a therapist. “A few months after I started that process, I was able to leave and leave for good.”

7. She’s made an album in lockdown and it’s an upbeat one

FKA twigs released an album, Magdalene, just before the pandemic hit. She’d planned to tour but says that plan was, “cut off at the knees.” Undeterred, she’s produced a new album while in lockdown. Of course, it’s all happened remotely. “All via the internet, all working with people that I’ve never worked with before,” she says. “I’ve got more collaborations and features on this album than I’ve ever had before, the majority with people I’ve never met in real life.” She says that the album is, “ironically, a lot lighter than the usual music that I make. I spent so much time in darkness… that when I’ve been in lockdown, I’ve been really missing my friends and going out… and dancing. I’ve wanted to make music for the people closest to me that I love.”

8. She’s a massive fan of Shakespears Sister and Adam Ant

FKA twigs's musical hero: Adam Ant

FKA twigs says she grew up loving Kate Bush, X-Ray Spex and especially Shakespears Sister. “Amaaaazing,” she enthuses. She’s surprised, but delighted, when Louis tells her that Shakespears Sister singer Siobhan Fahey used to be in Bananarama. When he asks if that pop background spoils them for her, she says, “No, man. That makes me like her more. That’s sick. I used to be Jessie J’s backing dancer. I love that stuff.” She’s also a huge fan of Adam Ant and once accosted him in the street. “I am a little bit embarrassed,” she says. “[When I was 18], I ran up to him on Old Compton Street and I gave him a hug and I wouldn’t let him go. I would hate it if someone did that to me.”

9. She’s experienced racism since the age of four

FKA twigs’s mother is a white Englishwoman and her father is a Black Jamaican. Growing up in Cheltenham, she says she was one of only two people of colour in her school and she was made to feel aware of her difference from the age of four. “I remember all the kids having to hold hands, like two-by-two, and [a girl] wouldn’t hold my hand in case the colour came off. I was probably about four and I’d never realised I was a different colour. It was the first time I’d ever, ever realised.” As an adult, she says she faced a barrage of racist abuse when she was in a relationship with the actor Robert Pattinson. “I think they considered that he should definitely be with someone white and blonde.” She says people on social media would compare her to monkeys, which deeply hurt her confidence for a long time. “But just for everyone to know, I now love how I look and I’m very confident.”

10. She’s becoming a pole dancing expert

If the pandemic hadn’t happened, twigs would be just completing a big tour for Magdalene. She says she learned two new skills for that tour. “I learned to pole dance and to do Wushu (a form of martial arts).” The Wushu hasn’t come in especially handy in lockdown, but she says she’s still enjoying pole dancing. “When I first started doing pole dancing, I couldn’t even climb the pole… I just wanted to fly. I’ve always been a very considered and delicate mover, coming from ballet and contemporary dance… but I’ve never been very good at flinging myself around.” She says pole dancing makes her feel, “amazing. I feel so alive.” She now has a pole in the middle of her living room. She’s also learning grade one piano, “and I love every single second of it.”

In response to the allegations against him, Shia LaBeouf has said in statements, "Many of the allegations are not true", but also "I have no excuses for my alcoholism or aggression, only rationalizations. I have been abusive to myself and everyone around me for years. I have a history of hurting the people closest to me. I’m ashamed of that history and am sorry to those I hurt. There is nothing else I can really say.”