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ABBA
Background information
Origin Stockholm, Sweden
Genre(s) Pop
Pop Rock
Years active 1972 – 1982
Label(s) Polar Music, Polydor, Atlantic, RCA, Universal, PolyGram
Associated
acts Hep Stars, Hootenanny Singers, Benny Anderssons Orkester, A*Teens,
Björn Again
Website ABBA - The Site
Former members
Anni-Frid Lyngstad (vocals)
Agnetha Fältskog (vocals)
Benny Andersson (keyboards, vocals)
Björn Ulvaeus (Guitar, vocals)
ABBA was a Swedish pop music group active from 1972 until 1982. The quartet
topped charts worldwide from the mid-1970s to the early 1980s. They remain a
fixture of radio playlists and continue to sell albums. The group has
reportedly sold more than 370 million records.[1][2]
ABBA was the first pop group from mainland Europe to enjoy consistent
success in the charts of the Anglophonic world (mainly the United Kingdom,
the United States, Canada, Republic of Ireland, Australia, and New Zealand),
and its enormous popularity subsequently opened the doors for other
Continental European acts.
1969–1971: the formative years
Benny Andersson was from the age of 18 a member of The Hep Stars
(1964–1969), a popular Swedish pop-rock group in the mid to late 1960s that
from the start performed mostly covers of international hits. The Hep Stars
were most successful in their early years, their live shows invariably
creating mob scenes, many of their fans being teenage girls. Andersson
played keyboards and eventually started writing original compositions for
his band, most of which became major hits: "No Response" (#3 in 1965),
"Sunny Girl", "Wedding", "Consolation" (all of which hit #1 in 1966), and "Speleman",
among others. Benny met Björn Ulvaeus in June 1966, and started writing
songs with him. Ulvaeus occasionally played guitar with The Hep Stars on
stage, and Andersson soon stepped in, adding piano during The Hootenanny
Singers' recording sessions. Andersson also had a fruitful songwriting
collaboration with Lasse Berghagen, with whom he wrote and submitted the
song "Hej, Clown" for the 1969 Melodifestivalen, the Swedish Eurovision Song
Contest finals. The song tied for first, but re-voting relegated Andersson's
song to #2. Andersson had also submitted another song for the contest, which
was rejected, but became a huge hit for singer Brita Borg: "Ljuva Sextiotal"
— written with Ulvaeus.
Björn Ulvaeus was from the age of 18 fronting The Hootenanny Singers
(1963–1974), a popular Swedish folk-skiffle group. Ulvaeus started writing
material for his band, and also attempted a solo career alongside it. His
band and Andersson's Hep Stars sometimes crossed paths while touring, and on
such an occasion in June 1966 Ulvaeus and Andersson decided to write a song
together. This, their first attempt, was "Isn't It Easy to Say", later
recorded by The Hep Stars — and more songs were to follow. Stig Anderson,
manager of the Hep Stars and founder of the Polar Music label, saw much
potential in the collaboration, and encouraged them to compose more. In
1969, the pair wrote and produced some of their first real hits together:
Brita Borg singing "Ljuva Sextiotal" ('Merry Sixties'), and The Hep Stars' "Speleman".
As their respective bands broke up, they teamed up and eventually recorded
their first album together in 1970, called Lycka ("Happiness" in Swedish),
on which they included their own compositions and handled all lead vocals.
Ulvaeus was still recording and performing with the Hootenanny Singers until
the summer of 1974, alongside ABBA, and for 20 years this band held the
record, spending 52 weeks in a row with their hit single "Omkring Tiggarn
Från Luossa", one of The Hootenannys' 40 hits on the radio charts.
Agnetha Fältskog, ABBA's youngest member, had a #1 record in Sweden when she
was only 17 and was soon noted by the critics and songwriters as a talented
composer, most of her songs being in the schlager style. Fältskog's main
inspiration in her early years was singers in the style of Connie Francis.
Along with her own compositions, she also recorded covers of foreign hits
and performed them on tours in Swedish folkparks. She became one of the most
popular Swedish female pop singers of the time. She even submitted a
self-written song for Melodifestivalen when only 17 ("Försonade"), but it
was rejected. Agnetha had briefly met Anni-Frid Lyngstad during a TV-show in
early 1968, and Björn Ulvaeus too at a concert venue a few months later.
During filming of a Swedish TV special in May 1969, she met Ulvaeus again,
and they eventually became a couple and married in 1970. In 1973, she
starred as Mary Magdalene in the original Swedish production of Jesus Christ
Superstar and attracted favourable reviews. Between 1968 and 1975, Fältskog
released five studio albums.
Anni-Frid "Frida" Lyngstad sang from the age of 13 with various dance bands
and worked mainly in a jazz-oriented cabaret style. In the summer of 1967,
she won a national talent competition, and then signed with EMI, as her
professional musical career began in earnest. Lyngstad released several
singles and performed regularly in the folkpark circuit and made appearances
on radio and TV. She had met Björn Ulvaeus briefly in 1963 during a talent
contest, and Agnetha Fältskog during a TV show in early 1968, but it was
during the last year of the decade that she would link up with her future
colleagues. On 1 March 1969, she participated in the Melodifestivalen, and
her entry, "Härlig är vår jord", came fourth. This is where she for the
first time met Benny Andersson in the TV studio, as he was the composer of "Hej,
Clown", which came second in the same competition. A few weeks later they
met again during a concert tour in southern Sweden and soon they became a
couple. Andersson also invited Lyngstad to sing backing vocals with Fältskog
on the Björn & Benny debut album, Lycka (October 1970), and during this time
he also started producing Lyngstad's debut album, Frida, which was released
in March 1971 and praised by critics. Lyngstad also played in several revues
and cabaret shows in Stockholm between 1969 and 1973. After ABBA formed, she
recorded another successful album in 1975, Frida Ensam, which included the
original Swedish rendition of "Fernando", which became a huge hit in
Scandinavia before the English version was recorded.
1972–1973: From 'Festfolk' to 'Björn, Benny, Agnetha & Anni-Frid' to
'ABBA'
Although Ulvaeus and Fältskog were married, and Andersson and Lyngstad were
engaged, all four of them were pursuing their own separate musical careers
during the first few years of the 1970s. However, an attempt at combining
their talents started in April 1970 when the two couples went on holiday
together to the island of Cyprus. What started as singing for fun on the
beach, ended up as an improvised live performance in front of the United
Nations soldiers stationed on the island. An idea was born, and November 1st
1970, the foursome launched their united stage act Festfolk, a cabaret show
which attracted good reviews, but the foursome didn't feel like working
together, and soon concentrated on individual projects again. Stig Anderson,
owner of Polar, was determined to break into the mainstream international
market with music by Benny and Björn ("One day the pair of you will write a
song that becomes a worldwide hit", he predicted). Stig
encouraged Ulvaeus and Andersson to write a song for the Swedish preliminary
of the Eurovision Song Contest, Melodifestivalen, and after two rejected
entries in 1971 ("Det kan Ingen Doktor Hjälpa" and "Välkommen Till Världen"),
they submitted "Säg Det Med En Sång", which would be performed by newcomer
Lena Anderson. "Say It with a Song" came third, convincing Stig he was on
the right track. The song became a huge hit in Sweden.
The first signs of foreign success came as a surprise, as the Björn & Benny
single She's My Kind Of Girl was released by chance by Epic in Japan, and
gave the duo a #1 there in March 1972.
Ulvaeus and Andersson persevered with their songwriting and experimented
with new sounds and vocal arrangements. One of the songs they came up with
was "People Need Love", released June 1972, featuring guest vocals by the
girls, who were now given much greater prominence. Everyone involved felt
enthusiastic about the new sound and Stig Anderson released it as a single,
credited to Björn & Benny, Agnetha & Anni-Frid. The song reached #17 in the
Swedish combined single & album charts, enough to convince them they were on
to something. The single also became the first record to chart for the
quartet in the United States, where it peaked at #114 on the Cashbox singles
chart and #117 on Record World's singles chart. Billed as Björn & Benny
(with Svenska Flicka), it was released there on Playboy Records. However,
according to Stig Anderson, "People Need Love" could have been a much bigger
American hit, but a small label like Playboy Records did not have the
distribution resources to meet the demand for the single from retailers and
radio programmers .[3]
Music sample:
* "People Need Love" (1972) (file info) — [Play media] play in browser
(beta)
o One of ABBA's first record which was credited to Björn & Benny, Agnetha &
Anni-Frid.
* "Ring Ring" (1973) (file info) — [Play media] play in browser (beta)
o A song which was a hit in many parts of Europe and headed off the Ring
Ring album.
* Problems playing the files? See media help.
The following year, 1973, they decided to have another try at the
Melodifestivalen, this time with the song "Ring Ring." The studio sessions
were handled by Michael B. Tretow, who experimented with a "wall of sound"
production technique that became the wholly new ABBA sound. Anderson
arranged an English translation of the lyrics by Neil Sedaka and Phil Cody
and they thought this would be a surefire winner, but in the
Melodifestivalen, on 10 February 1973, it came third, and thus never reached
the international contest. Nevertheless the proto-group put out their first
album, called Ring Ring, still carrying the awkward name of Björn, Benny,
Agnetha & Frida. The album did well and the "Ring Ring" single was a hit in
many parts of Europe, but Anderson felt the true breakthrough could only
come with a UK or US hit.
The ABBA name
In the spring of 1973, Stig Anderson, tired of unwieldy names, started to
refer to the group privately and publicly as ABBA. At first this was as a
joke, since Abba was also the name of a well-known fish-canning company in
Sweden. However, since the fish canners were more or less unknown outside
Sweden, Anderson came to believe the name would work in international
markets. A competition to find a suitable name for the group was held in a
Gothenburg newspaper. The group were impressed with the names Alibaba and
Baba but in the end all the entries were ignored and it was announced in the
summer that the name ABBA was official. Later the group negotiated with the
canners for the right to the name.
The first time the name "ABBA" is found written on paper is on a recording
session sheet from the Metronome Studio in Stockholm, dated 16 October 1973.
It was first written as "Björn, Benny, Agnetha & Frida", but was
subsequently crossed out with "ABBA" written in large letters on top.
The group name ABBA is an acronym formed from the first letters of each
group member's name: Agnetha, Björn, Benny and Anni-Frid (Frida). The first
'B' in the logo version of the name was reversed on the band's promotional
material from 1976 onwards and became the group's registered trademark.
1974: "Waterloo" and Eurovision victory
Just as in 1972 and 1973, Ulvaeus, Andersson, and manager Stig Anderson
believed in the possibilities of the Melodifestivalen and Eurovision. In
late 1973, the composers were invited to contribute a song for the 1974
contest, and from a number of newly written compositions, the foursome chose
the upbeat "Waterloo"; the group was now inspired by the growing glam rock
scene in England. "Waterloo" was an unashamedly glam-style pop track
produced with Michael B. Tretow's wall-of-sound approach.
ABBA won their national heats on Swedish TV on 9 February 1974, and with
this third attempt were far more experienced and better prepared for the
international contest. With an album's worth of material released when the
show was held at the Brighton Dome in England on 6 April 1974, the song won
and catapulted them into British consciousness for the first time — and to
the top of the charts all over Europe.
"Waterloo" was ABBA's first UK #1 single. In the US, it reached #6 on the
Billboard Hot 100 chart, paving the way for their first album there (their
second album, Waterloo, but now billed as ABBA) — although it only peaked at
#145 on the Billboard 200 album chart.
ABBA's follow-up single, "Honey, Honey", reached #27 in the US, and also
became a top three hit in Germany. However, in the UK, a cover version of
the song by the act Sweet Dreams made #10 on the chart. This was primarily
because ABBA's British record company, Epic, decided to re-release "Ring
Ring" (albeit in a remixed format) instead. It failed to reach the Top 30,
increasing growing speculation of the group simply being Eurovision one-hit
wonders.
Music sample:
* "Waterloo" (1974) (file info) — [Play media] play in browser (beta)
o An unashamedly glam-style pop track now credited to the catchy name ABBA.
* "Watch Out" (1974) (file info) — [Play media] play in browser (beta)
o The B-side of the single "Waterloo", which was performed in some of their
folkpark shows.
* "S.O.S." (1975) (file info) — [Play media] play in browser (beta)
o Third single from their self-titled 1975 album, which put the band back on
the worldwide charts.
* "Mamma Mia" (1975) (file info) — [Play media] play in browser (beta)
o One of the first songs to make a breakthrough in the United Kingdom.
* Problems playing the files? See media help.
In November 1974, ABBA embarked on their first European tour, playing dates
in Denmark, West Germany, and Austria. It wasn't as successful as the band
had hoped, since most of the venues didn't sell out, and due to a lack of
demand, they were even forced to cancel a few shows, including a sole
scheduled concert in Switzerland. The second leg of the tour that took them
through Scandinavia in January 1975 was entirely different: they played to
full houses and finally got the reception they hoped for. For three weeks in
the summer of 1975, ABBA compensated for the Swedish tour they had
tentatively scheduled for the previous summer, but had to cancel after their
Eurovision triumph. They played sixteen open-air dates in Sweden and
Finland, attracting huge crowds. Their Stockholm show at the Gröna Lund
amusement park was seen by an estimated audience of 19,000.
1975: "S.O.S.", "Mamma Mia"
The release of their third album, ABBA (known to fans as "The Limo Album"),
and their single "SOS" consolidated their presence in the UK, where the
single hit the top ten and the album reached #13. British success was
further solidified with "Mamma Mia" reaching the UK #1 spot at the end of
January 1976.
In the US, "SOS" reached #10 on the Record World Top 100 singles chart and
#15 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, picking up the BMI Award along the way
as one of the most played songs on American radio in 1975.
Yet the success of the group in the United States remained uneven. While
they managed to break into the US singles market where, by early 1976, they
already had four Top 30 singles, the album market proved to be tough to
crack. The eponymous ABBA album generated no fewer than three real American
hits, and yet it only peaked at #165 on the Cashbox album chart and #174 on
the Billboard 200 chart. Opinions were voiced, by Creem in particular, that
in the US ABBA had endured "a very sloppy promotional campaign".
1976: Greatest Hits, Arrival and "Dancing Queen"
In March 1976, the band released the compilation Greatest Hits, despite
having had only six Top 40 hits in the UK and the US. Nevertheless, it
became their first UK #1 album and included "Fernando", which had originally
been written in Swedish for Lyngstad's 1975 Andersson-produced solo LP,
Frida ensam (or Frida alone), prompting a subsequent English-language
recording by the group. One of ABBA's best-known and most popular tracks
ever, "Fernando" did not appear on the Swedish release of Greatest Hits. It
would have to wait until 1982's The Singles: The First Ten Years to appear
on an album in an English-language version credited to ABBA. The track was
included on the Australian and New Zealand release of their 1976 album,
Arrival. Greatest Hits took ABBA into the Top 50 on the US album charts for
the first time and eventually went on to sell more than a million copies
there.
In the US, "Fernando" reached the Top 10 of the Cashbox Top 100 singles
chart and #13 on the Billboard Hot 100. It also topped the Billboard Adult
Contemporary chart, ABBA's first American number one single of any kind. In
Australia, as of 2007 the song still held the record for the most weeks
spent at number one (15 weeks) (along with The Beatles' "Hey
Jude").
The group's next album, Arrival, represented a new level of accomplishment
in both songwriting and studio work, prompting rave reviews from more
rock-orientated UK music weeklies such as Melody Maker and New Musical
Express, and mostly appreciative notices from American critics. In fact, hit
after hit flowed from Arrival: "Money, Money, Money", "Knowing Me, Knowing
You" and their most enduring and definitive hit, "Dancing Queen". In 1977,
Arrival was nominated for the inaugural BRIT Award in the category Best
International Album of the Year. By this time ABBA were very popular in the
UK, most of Western Europe and Australia.
Their popularity in the US would remain on a comparatively smaller scale,
and "Dancing Queen" became the only Billboard Hot 100 #1 single they ever
had there (they did, however, get three more singles to the #1 position on
other Billboard charts, including Billboard Adult Contemporary and Hot Dance
Club Play). Nevertheless, Arrival finally became a true breakthrough release
for ABBA on the US album market where it peaked at #20 on the Billboard
album chart.
1977: European tour, Australian tour, The Movie and The Album
In January 1977, ABBA hit the road. By this time, the group's status had
changed dramatically and they were clearly regarded as superstars. They
opened their much anticipated tour in Oslo, Norway, on 28 January, and
mounted a lavishly produced spectacle that included a few scenes from their
self-penned mini-operetta. The concert attracted immense media attention
from across Europe and Australia. They continued the tour through Western
Europe and ended it with shows in the UK in Manchester, Birmingham and two
sold-out concerts at London's Royal Albert Hall. Tickets for these two shows
were available only by mail application and it was later revealed that the
box-office received 3.5 million requests for tickets. There were, however,
complaints about the group's performance lacking "personality" and being
"too polished" and "sterile".
After the European part of the tour, in March 1977, ABBA played eleven dates
in Australia. The trip was accompanied by mass hysteria and unprecedented
media attention, and is vividly captured on film in ABBA: The Movie,
directed by Lasse Hallström.
The Australian tour and its subsequent ABBA: The Movie produced some ABBA
lore, as well. Agnetha Fältskog's blonde good looks had long made her the
band's 'pin-up girl', a role she disdained. During the Australian tour, she
performed in a skin-tight white jumpsuit, causing one Australian newspaper
to use the headline "Agnetha's bottom tops dull show". When asked about this
at a news conference, she replied: "Don't they have bottoms in Australia?"
[4]
In December 1977 (January 1978 in many territories), ABBA followed up
Arrival with the more musically and lyrically ambitious fifth album The
Album, which was released to coincide with ABBA: The Movie. Although the
album was less well-received by the critics in the UK, it did spawn more
worldwide hits: "The Name of the Game" and "Take a Chance on Me", both of
which topped the UK charts, and reached #12 and #3, respectively, on the
Billboard Hot 100 chart in the US. This album also included the ABBA
signature tune, "Thank You for the Music", released as a single in the UK in
1983, and had been the B-side of "Eagle" in countries where the latter had
been released.
1978: Polar Music Studio opens, US visit and "Summer Night City"
By 1978, ABBA were a megagroup. They converted a disused cinema into the
Polar Music Studio, a new state-of-the-art studio in Stockholm which was
used by several other bands (for example, Led Zeppelin's In Through the Out
Door and Genesis' Duke were recorded there).
During May, the group went to the US for a huge promotional campaign, being
guests on Olivia Newton-John's TV show among other things. However, a lot of
effort was put into the new recording studio in Stockholm. The recording
sessions for "Summer Night City" were an uphill struggle, but upon release
the song became a considerable hit for the group. The track would also set
the stage for ABBA's foray into disco with their upcoming album.
1979: Agnetha and Björn's divorce, Voulez-Vous and the US/Europe tour
In January 1979, the group performed "Chiquitita" at the Music for UNICEF
Concert held at the United Nations General Assembly. ABBA donated the
copyright of this worldwide hit to the UNICEF; see Music for UNICEF Concert.
The group's sixth album, Voulez-Vous, was released in April 1979, with two
background tracks recorded in the famous Criteria Studios in Miami, U.S.
with the assistance, among others, of the recording engineer Tom Dowd. The
album topped the charts across Europe and in Japan, hit the Top 10 in Canada
and Australia and the Top 20 in the US. None of the singles from the album
reached #1 on the UK charts, but "Chiquitita", "Does Your Mother Know", "Voulez-Vous"
and "I Have a Dream" all charted no lower than #4. In Canada, "I Have a
Dream" became ABBA's second #1 on the RPM Adult Contemporary chart (the
first being "Fernando").
Later that year, the group released their second compilation album, Greatest
Hits Vol. 2, which featured a brand new track: "Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (A Man
After Midnight)", their best known disco hit in Europe. In Russia during the
late 1970s, they were paid in oil commodities because of an embargo on the
ruble. [5]
On 13 September 1979, ABBA began their first (and only) North American Tour
at the Northlands Coliseum, in Edmonton, Canada, with a full house of
14,000. During the next four weeks, they played a total of seventeen
sold-out dates, thirteen in the U.S. and four in Canada.
The last scheduled ABBA concert on U.S. soil, in Washington, DC, was
cancelled due to Agnetha Fältskog's emotional distress suffered during the
flight from New York to Boston, when the private plane she was on was
subjected to extreme weather conditions (see Windsor Locks, Connecticut
Tornado) and could not land for a long time. The tour ended with a show in
Toronto, Canada at Maple Leaf Gardens before a capacity crowd of 18,000. The
shows also generated the same type of complaints that were expressed during
the group's 1977 tour: many fans regarded ABBA as more of a studio group
than a live band.
On 19 October 1979, the tour resumed in Western Europe where the band played
23 sold-out gigs, including an unprecedented six sold-out nights at London's
Wembley Arena.
1980: Japan tour and Super Trouper
In March 1980, ABBA travelled to Japan where upon their arrival at Narita
International Airport, they were besieged by thousands of fans. The group
played eleven concerts to full houses, including six shows at Tokyo's
Budokan. This tour was the last "on the road" adventure of their career.
The year 1980 saw the release of ABBA's seventh album Super Trouper, which
reflected a certain change in ABBA's style with more prominent use of
synthesisers and increasingly more personal lyrics. It set a record for the
most pre-orders ever received for a UK album after one million copies were
ordered before release. Anticipation for the album had been built up by "The
Winner Takes It All", the group's eighth UK chart topper (and their first
since 1978). In the US, the single reached #8 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart
and became ABBA's second Billboard Adult Contemporary #1. The song was
allegedly written about Ulvaeus and Fältskog's marital tribulations. The
next single from the album, "Super Trouper", also hit #1 in the UK but
failed to reach the Top 40 in the US. Another track from Super Trouper, "Lay
All Your Love on Me", released in 1981 as a 12-inch single only in selected
territories, managed to top the Billboard Hot Dance Club Play chart and
peaked at #7 on the UK singles chart becoming at the time the highest ever
charting 12-inch release in UK chart history.
Also in 1980, ABBA recorded a compilation of Spanish-language versions of
their hits called Gracias Por La Música. It was released in Spanish-speaking
countries as well as Japan and Australia. The album became a major success
and along with the Spanish version of "Chiquitita", this signalled the
group's breakthrough in South America.
1981: Anni-Frid and Benny's divorce and The Visitors
The Visitors (1981), ABBA's eighth and final studio album, showed a
songwriting maturity and depth of feeling distinctly lacking from their
earlier recordings but still placed the band squarely in the pop genre, with
catchy tunes and harmonies. Although not revealed at the time of its
release, the album's title track, according to Ulvaeus, refers to the secret
meetings held against the approval of totalitarian governments in
Soviet-dominated states, while other tracks address topics like failed
relationships, the threat of war, ageing, loss of innocence, a parent
watching a child grow up and so on. This change of content was reflected in
the relative commercial decline, mostly evident in the UK, after the release
of the #3 single "One of Us" in December 1981.
Although it topped the charts across most of Europe, entered the Top 20 in
France and Japan and the Top 30 in the US and Australia, The Visitors was
not as commercially successful as its predecessors..
A track from the The Visitors, "When All Is Said And Done", was released as
a single in North America, Australia and New Zealand, and became ABBA's
final Top 30 hit in the US, while reaching #4 on the RPM Adult Contemporary
chart in Canada. The song's lyrics (as with "The Winner Takes It All" and
"One of Us") dealt with the painful experience of splitting up from a
long-term partner: February 1981 saw Andersson and Lyngstad announce their
divorce, increasing speculation of tension within the band. Also released in
the US was the title track of The Visitors, which hit the Top Ten on the
Billboard Hot Dance Club Play chart.
1982: The last recording sessions, future plans and breaking up
In the spring of 1982, songwriting sessions had started, and the group came
together for more recordings. Plans were sketchy, but a new album was
discussed and the prospect raised of a small tour. The recording sessions in
May and June were an uphill struggle, and only a handful of songs were
eventually recorded. Several tapes were shelved, and the foursome took a
break for the summer.
Back in the studio in early August, the group had changed plans for the rest
of the year: they settled for a Christmas release of a double album
compilation of all their past successes to be named The Singles: The First
Ten Years. New recording sessions took place, and during the autumn, they
released the singles "The Day Before You Came"/"Cassandra", and "Under
Attack"/"You Owe Me One", the A-sides of which were included on the
compilation album.
There was little interest in the singles, but the album went to #1 in the UK
and Belgium, Top 5 in the Netherlands and Germany and Top 20 in many other
countries.
Other songs recorded during the year, "I Am the City" and "Just Like That",
were left in the can. "I Am the City" was eventually released as a bonus
track on the compilation album More ABBA Gold in 1993.
The group travelled to London to promote The Singles: The First Ten Years in
the first week of November 1982, appearing on Saturday Superstore and The
Late, Late Breakfast Show, and also to Germany in the second week, to
perform in Show Express.
On 19 November 1982, ABBA appeared for the last time in Sweden on the TV
programme Nöjesmaskinen, and on 11 December 1982, they made their last
performance ever — transmitted to the UK on Noel Edmonds' The Late, Late
Breakfast Show, via a live link from a TV studio in Stockholm.
Although plans were to continue work as a foursome, they never got together
again.
Despite numerous requests from fans, Ulvaeus and Andersson are still
refusing to release "Just Like That" in its entirety, even though it has
surfaced on bootlegs.
Andersson and Ulvaeus had meetings with Tim Rice in December 1981, and in
early 1983 started songwriting sessions for their musical project Chess,
while Fältskog and Lyngstad both concentrated on their international solo
careers.
Last performances/reunions
All four members made their last public appearance — as four 'friends' more
than as ABBA — in January 1986, when they recorded a video of themselves
performing an acoustic version of "Tivedshambo", (the first song written by
their manager, Stig Anderson), for a Swedish TV show honouring Anderson on
his 55th birthday. The four had not seen each other for more than two years.
That same year the foursome also performed privately at another friend's
40th birthday: their old tour manager, Claes af Geijerstam. They sang a
self-composed song titled "Der Kleine Franz" (later to surface in Chess).
1986 also saw the release of their ABBA Live album, featuring selections of
live performances from their 1977 and 1979 tours.
Their last known appearance (not filmed) as a group, was as guests in 1999
on the 50th birthday of Görel Hanser, long-time friend of all four, and also
former secretary of Stig Anderson. Görel still works for Benny Andersson in
his Mono Music offices, and still handles matters concerning all four former
members. Honouring Görel, ABBA performed a Swedish birthday song ("Med En
Enkel Tulipan") a cappella. [6]
Nowadays Andersson and Ulvaeus are frequently at premiéres of the musical
Mamma Mia! or other galas, every now and then joined by Frida Lyngstad, as
at the show's fifth anniversary in London. All four members attended the
premiére in Stockholm of the Swedish staging of the musical, in February
2005, but were not seen nor photographed together. January 2007 saw Fältskog
and Ulvaeus attend the show's last performance.
Benny Andersson has on several occasions performed old ABBA songs. In June
1992 he and Björn Ulvaeus appeared with U2 at a Stockholm concert, singing
the chorus of "Dancing Queen", and a few years later during the final
performance of the B & B in Concert in Stockholm, Andersson joined the cast
for an encore at the piano. Andersson frequently adds an ABBA song to the
playlist when he performs with his BAO! band. He also played the piano
during new recordings of the ABBA songs "Like an Angel Passing Through My
Room" with opera singer Anne Sophie Von Otter, and "When All Is Said And
Done" with Swede Victoria Tolstoy. Frida Lyngstad performed and recorded an
a cappella version of "Dancing Queen" with the Swedish group The Real Group
in 1993, and has also re-recorded "I Have a Dream" with Swiss Dan Daniell in
2003. Apart from that, none of the former members perform their old songs.
The four members have never officially announced the end of the group, but
as the years pass by the chances of ABBA working together again have become
increasingly slim, and the group is now considered dissolved.
Benny and Björn after ABBA
In October 1984, Ulvaeus and Andersson released the musical concept double
album Chess, created together with lyricist Tim Rice, and with vocals by
among others Elaine Paige, Murray Head, Barbra Dickson and swedes Tommy
Körberg and Björn Skifs. The singles "One Night in Bangkok" and "I Know Him
So Well" were both huge successes. In May 1986, the musical premiéred in the
West End of London, and ran for almost three years. On Broadway it opened in
April 1988, but closed within two months due to very bad reviews. The
musical has been staged regularly on small scale to great success, and even
the concert version is popular. In Stockholm, the composers staged Chess På
Svenska ('Chess in Swedish') in 2003, with new material.
What is considered to be Andersson and Ulvaeus' masterpiece, however, is
Kristina från Duvemåla, a Swedish epic musical, which the composers
premiéred in Malmö in southern Sweden in October 1995, directed for the
stage by Lars Rudolfsson and based on the The Emigrants tetralogy by Swedish
novelist Vilhelm Moberg. In Sweden, the tale of one family's migration from
the poor Småland of 1840 to the promised lands in Minnesota is considered a
national treasure. (The film version of 1971 was nominated for four Academy
Awards.) The musical ran for five years in Stockholm, and an English version
has been in the works for a long time, and it had been reported that the
Broadway pre-production is in its earliest stage.
Their next project was Mamma Mia!, a musical built around 24 of ABBA's songs
and produced by Ulvaeus. It is a worldwide box-office blockbuster with
versions in several languages currently being played in many countries,
including the UK (West End premiere in April 1999), USA (Broadway premiere
in 2001) and Sweden (Swedish language premiere in 2005).
A film version of Mamma Mia! is scheduled to premiére on 18 July 2008. [7]
Since 1983, besides Chess and Kristina Från Duvemåla, Benny Andersson has
continued writing songs with Björn Ulvaeus. The pair produced two English
language pop albums with Swedish duo Gemini in 1985 and 1987. The same year,
Andersson released his first solo album on his own label, a collection of
his own folk music material called Klinga Mina Klockor, and followed it with
November 1989. In the 1990s, Benny wrote music for the popular Swedish
cabaret quartet The Ainbusk Singers, giving them two massive hits: "Lassie"
and "Älska Mig", and later produced Shapes — an English language album by
the group's Josefin Nilsson — with all-new material by him and Ulvaeus.
Andersson has regularly written music for films (most notably to Roy
Andersson's Songs from the Second Floor), and in 2001 put together his own
band, BAO!, which has released two successful albums in 2001 and 2004. Benny
Andersson has the record of staying in the longest ever run in the
Svensktoppen charts in April 2007 (the song "Du Är Min Man", sung by Helen
Sjöholm is still there, in its 147th? week). Andersson is
currently recording new material with BAO! as well as producing the
soundtrack to the Mamma Mia! film, using the musicians of ABBA's backing
band.
Björn Ulvaeus is heavily involved in the musical Mamma Mia! and its current
stagings worldwide. He has not appeared on stage performing music since
ABBA, but had a reunion with his co-members of The Hootenanny Singers on 16
July 2005 at a music festival in his hometown of Västervik.
Frida and Agnetha after ABBA
Both female members of ABBA pursued solo careers on the international scene
following the break-up of the band.
In September 1982, Anni-Frid Lyngstad released her Phil Collins-produced
album, Something's Going On. This Top 20 UK and Top 50 US release included
the hit single "I Know There's Something Going On", which reached No.13 on
the Billboard Hot 100, and became a Top Five hit in Australia and most of
Europe. The album sold one million copies internationally.
Agnetha Fältskog followed in 1983 with the album Wrap Your Arms Around Me.
This included the hit single "The Heat Is On", which was a big hit all over
Europe and Scandinavia that year. In the US, Fältskog scored a Billboard Top
30 hit with "Can't Shake Loose". In Europe, the single "Wrap Your Arms
Around Me" was another successful hit, topping the charts in Belgium and
Denmark, reaching the Top 5 in Sweden and Top 20 in Germany and France. Her
album sold over 1.3 million copies worldwide.
Lyngstad's second solo album, Shine (produced by Steve Lillywhite), released
in 1984, was a moderate success in Sweden but a commercial failure
elsewhere. Fältskog fared better with her second post-ABBA solo album, Eyes
of a Woman. It reached #2 in Sweden and performed reasonably well in Europe.
The first single from the album was "I Won't Let You Go".
After I Stand Alone, produced by Peter Cetera (which included the Billboard
hit "I Wasn't The One") in 1988, Fältskog withdrew from public life and
halted her music career. In 1996, she released her autobiography, called As
I Am, and a compilation album featuring her solo hits alongside some ABBA
classics. In 2004, she made a successful comeback, releasing the critically
acclaimed album My Colouring Book, which debuted at #1 in Sweden (achieving
triple-platinum status), #6 in Germany, and #12 in the UK (winning a silver
award). The album also achieved gold status in Finland. The single "If I
Thought You'd Ever Change Your Mind" became Fältskog's biggest solo hit in
the UK, reaching #9 in the midweek sales, but finally settling for the #11
position. The single reached #2 in Sweden and was a hit all over Scandinavia
and Europe. Lately, Fältskog's public appearances have been more frequent.
In January 2007, she sang a live duet on stage with Swedish singer Tommy
Körberg (of Chess fame) at the after party for the final showing of the ABBA
musical, Mamma Mia!, in Stockholm, at which Benny Andersson and Björn
Ulvaeus were also present. It is rumoured that Agnetha Fältskog is currently
planning a new solo album to be released in 2008.
Anni-Frid Lyngstad released her last album to date in 1996 (for Scandinavia
only), the Swedish-language Djupa andetag (Deep Breaths). It reached #1 in
Sweden, selling around 90,000 copies, although none of the
singles released from the album reached the Top 10. In 2004, Lyngstad
recorded a song called "The Sun Will Shine Again", written especially for
her and released with former Deep Purple member Jon Lord, while the
following year, she released a career retrospective DVD. Nowadays, Lyngstad
lives a low-profile life but every now and then appears at a party or
charity function. On 26 August 1992, she married Prince Heinrch Ruzzo Reuss
von Plauen (24 May 1950 – 29 October 1999), of the German Reuss family. Von
Plauen died of lymphoma at the age of 49. In addition to losing her husband,
Lyngstad had also lost her daughter in a car crash a year earlier.
Revival
After receiving little attention during the acme of punk and new wave in the
mid- and late 1980s, ABBA experienced a major resurgence in the new decade:
starting with UK synth-pop duo Erasure's release of an EP featuring cover
versions of their songs, which topped the charts in the spring of 1992. As
U2 arrived in Stockholm for a concert in June of that year, the band paid
homage to ABBA by inviting Björn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson to join them on
stage for a rendition of "Dancing Queen", playing guitar and keyboards. The
September 1992 release of ABBA Gold: Greatest Hits, a new compilation album,
ended up selling massively worldwide and setting chart longevity records. In
the US, the album became the most popular ABBA release ever there, selling
more than six million copies to date.
The enormous interest in the Gold compilation saw the release of More ABBA
Gold: More ABBA Hits in 1993. This collection also contained the bonus track
"I Am the City", one of the unreleased songs from the 1982 recording
sessions.
In 1994, two Australian movies caught the attention of the world's media,
both focussing on admiration for ABBA: The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of
the Desert and Muriel's Wedding. The same year, Thank You for the Music, a
four-disc box set comprising all the hits and stand-out album tracks was
released with the involvement of all four members. For this release, several
demo versions and odd tracks were discovered in the Polar vaults.
ABBA were soon recognised and embraced by other acts: Evan Dando of The
Lemonheads recorded what fans consider the best cover version of "Knowing
Me, Knowing You", Sinéad O'Connor and Boyzone's Stephen
Gately have recorded "Chiquitita", Tanita Tikaram, and Blancmange paid
tribute to "The Day Before You Came", Cliff Richard covered "Lay All Your
Love On Me", while Dionne Warwick recorded her version of "SOS". Tribute
albums were released both in Sweden and the UK, and tribute bands such as
Bjorn Again and Arrival found a market; the former had to put together
several incarnations of themselves to cover the huge demand.
In Sweden, the growing recognition of the legacy of Andersson and Ulvaeus
resulted in the 1998 B & B Concerts: a tribute concert (with Swedish singers
who had worked with the composers through the years) showcasing not only
their ABBA years, but even hits from the 1960s and after ABBA. The concert
was a huge success, released on CD, and later toured Scandinavia and even
went to Beijing in China for two concerts. In 1999, Sweden saw the birth of
ABBA Teens, later re-named A*Teens, recording techno-pop versions of ABBA
songs to huge success worldwide: not only the English original versions, but
ABBA's Spanish versions also.
In April 1999, the Mamma Mia! musical opened in London, and soon premiéred
in cities worldwide to huge success.
In 2000 ABBA were reported to have turned down an offer of approximately
US$1,000,000,000 (one billion US dollars) to do a reunion tour consisting of
100 concerts. [10][11]
With Mamma Mia!'s huge success worldwide, and the forthcoming film starring
Meryl Streep and Pierce Brosnan, there is a huge interest in ABBA's music.
However, in a November 2004 interview with the German magazine Bunte,
Ulvaeus said a reunion would not satisfy ABBA's many fans, even though there
are legions of them around the world often clamouring for one.
Trivia
* Although "Dancing Queen" gave ABBA their only #1 in the USA on 9 April
1977, "Take a Chance on Me" (which reached #3 in 1978) — measured in sales
and other statistics — actually remains the group's biggest American
hit.
* The ticket sales for ABBA's two 14 February concerts at the Royal Albert
Hall during their 1977 European tour surprised everyone: for the available
12,000 tickets, the Hall received 3.5 million ticket applications, enough to
fill the venue some 580 times.
* On Saturday, 20 March 1976, at 6.30pm, Australian TV's Channel 9 broadcast
The Best of ABBA, filmed during the group's visit a week before. The
transmission had more than half of the population watching: 54% according to
contemporary reports. (The previous record was held by the
Moon landing in 1969.) The record is unbeaten to this day.
* Anni-Frid Lyngstad did backing vocals on Swedish singer Harpo's massive
1975 hit "Movie Star", which went on to reach #1 in Sweden and Germany, #2
in Australia and #24 in the UK. (It has sometimes been reported that Agnetha
Fältskog also sang on the song but this is incorrect.)
* Björn Ulvaeus' father was born Gunnar Andersson, but decided to change his
surname to Ulvaeus. ABBA's manager, Stig Anderson, was also born Andersson,
but decided to drop an 's' as an adult.
* Anni-Frid Lyngstad briefly met Björn Ulvaeus at a talent contest in
September 1963; Ulvaeus performed with The Hootenanny Singers (at this stage
named The West Bay Singers; "West Bay" as in Swedish "Västervik"). A very
young Norwegian girl also participated in the same contest: Anne Karine
Strøm, who would sing the Norwegian entry in the 1974 Eurovision Song
Contest.
* Agnetha Fältskog went to see The Hootenanny Singers perform when she was
only 15, and remembers: "All the girls were looking at Björn. My friends
said, 'Isn't he cute?' But I said Johan was the cutest. I knew that in
reality I liked Björn the most — I just wanted to stand apart from my
friends."
* Anni-Frid Lyngstad once happened to see The Hep Stars perform at a folk
park venue, and was shocked by their stage act. She did not find their music
interesting at all.
* Björn Ulvaeus remembers seeing Agnetha Fältskog on TV in January 1968 (her
television debut), and became immediately interested in the blonde
songwriter — so much that he cannot recall the brunette Anni-Frid Lyngstad,
who also performed on the show.
* When Sweden hosted the 1975 Eurovision Song Contest, ABBA was not even
invited to be present.
* During their recording years (eight albums), ABBA only recorded their own
written material apart from a short 4-minute medley of three songs recorded
in 1975 for a charity album: "Pick a Bale of Cotton"/"On Top of Old
Smokey"/"Midnight Special". These were American folk songs recorded by
artists as diverse as Leadbelly, Pete Seeger and Burl Ives. The medley also
appears on the re-release of ABBA's self-titled 1975 album.
* Alongside their own recording sessions, the four members of ABBA also
spent a considerable amount of time in the studio backing other artists: the
girls' voices are prominent on records by Ted Gärdestad, Lill-Babs, Lena
Andersson and Finn Kalvik and several others. In 1975, their recording
engineer, Michael B. Tretow, supervised recording sessions for an album
named Let's Boogie, and all four members of ABBA joined in: backing vocals
were provided by Lyngstad and Fältskog, the latter also played the piano,
Ulvaeus guitar and Andersson keyboards. Fältskog also added vocals to Ulf
Lundells "Snön faller och vi med den", and Lyngstad did the same for Adam
Ant's "Strip".
* Agnetha Fältskog opted for a career in West Germany only months after her
breakthrough in 1968, and recorded some 16 songs in German. Fältskog was
engaged to German singer/songwriter Dieter Zimmermann for almost a year
before she met Björn Ulvaeus.
* Abba Played Dancing Queen LIVE, in Springvale,Victoria,Australia,Earth.
* Abba is considered by many the 3rd largest selling recording artist in
music history (behind Elvis & The Beatles).
Discography
Legacy
ABBA's success subsequently opened the doors for many other European
acts. In November 2006 plans for an ABBA museum in
Stockholm were announced. The idea has the backing of the band and the
museum is expected to open in the spring of 2009. www.abbathemuseum.com
Influence
* In 1992, Erasure released an EP called "ABBA-esque". It consisted of four
covers of ABBA songs: "SOS", "Lay All Your Love on Me," "Voulez-Vous," and
"Take a Chance on Me."
* The hit song "Bring Me Edelweiss" (1989) by Edelweiss features the tune
and some lyrics from "SOS". This caused some controversy between Ulvaeus and
Andersson, and manager Stig Anderson, who had granted approval to use the
song without consulting the others.
* Kylie Minogue performed "Dancing Queen" at the closing ceremony of the
2000 Sydney Olympic Games, and also performed it in her live shows.
* The ABBA tribute band Björn Again became so successful that as of 2004
there were five casts of Björn Again performing in various parts of the
world. The original Björn Again had been touring for 15 years, longer than
the original group.
* Techno and house remakes of many original ABBA hits were released under
the name ABBAcadabra.
* Magnetic Fields frontman Stephin Merritt regularly lists ABBA as his
favorite band.
* Elvis Costello included three lines from "Dancing Queen" in the lyrics of
the title track of his 2002 album, When I Was Cruel.
* The Fugees sampled ABBA's "The Name of the Game" for their contribution to
the 1996 When We Were Kings soundtrack, Rumble in the Jungle. It was the
first time ABBA ever gave permission for one of their songs to be sampled.
* Madonna sampled the group's "Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (A Man After Midnight)"
in her 2005 single "Hung Up". She subsequently honoured them during the
finale of her Confessions tour (2006) when she donned an outfit based on
Fältskog's and Lyngstad's costumes from ABBA's 1979 world tour, and a
sequined cape emblazoned with the legend "Dancing Queen". ABBA's ABBA Gold:
Greatest Hits album was sold alongside her own merchandise during the tour.
* There is a heavy metal tribute album to ABBA entitled A Tribute to ABBA
featuring prominent Swedish metal bands such Therion and Tad Morose. A
number of ABBA hits are performed in the style of heavy metal. In addition,
Swedish metal guitarist Yngwie Malmsteen covered "Gimme! Gimme! Gimme!".
* In the late 1990s, the teenage band A*Teens was formed. Their entire first
album was made up of ABBA covers, including "Mamma Mia", "Dancing Queen",
and "Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (A Man After Midnight)". Original singles of the
band include artwork that list them as the ABBA*Teens.
* During the Zoo TV tour in 1992/93, U2 frequently played Dancing Queen. In
the Swedish leg of the tour they were joined for the song by Benny and Björn.
Bono and The Edge went down on their knees shouting "We're not worthy", in a
reference to Wayne's World.
Fashion and videos
ABBA were widely noted for the colourful and trend-setting costumes its
members wore. The videos that accompanied some of their biggest hits are
often cited as being among the earliest examples of the genre. Though the
Beatles, the Rolling Stones, the Kinks, the Who, Bob Dylan and others had
made several videos to promote their songs, it still hadn't become the
industry standard by the early to mid-1970s. Most of ABBA's
videos (and ABBA: The Movie) were directed by Lasse Hallström who would
later direct the films My Life as a Dog, The Cider House Rules and Chocolat.
ABBA made videos because their songs were hits in so many different
countries and personal appearances weren't always possible. This was also in
an effort to minimise travelling, particularly to countries that would have
required extremely long flights. Fältskog and Ulvaeus had two young
children, and Fältskog, who was also afraid of flying, was very reluctant to
leave her children for such a long time. ABBA's manager, Stig Anderson,
realised the potential of showing a simple video clip on television to
publicise a single or album, thereby allowing easier and quicker exposure
than a concert tour. Some of these videos became classics because of the
1970s era costumes and early video effects, such as the grouping of the band
members in different combinations of pairs, overlapping one singer's profile
with the other's full face, and the contrasting of one member against
another.
Nowadays, most of their videos can be seen on the DVDs ABBA Gold and The
Definitive Collection.
Bibliography
* Bright Lights Dark Shadows: The Real Story of ABBA by Carl Magnus Palm
(2002) ISBN 0-7119-9194-4
* From "ABBA" to "Mamma Mia!" by Carl Magnus Palm (2004) ISBN 1-85227-864-1
* ABBA photo book Collection of band photography
* World's first ABBA museum to open in Stockholm (The Local)
Notes
1. ^ Abba, The Book Potiez, Jean-Marie; 15 August 2005; accessed December
2006; claims 350 million records sold as of 2000
2. ^ It's Abba on the phone making a lot more money, money, money Sherwin,
Adam; The Times; April 19 2006; accessed December 2006; claims 370 million
3. ^ Interview with Songwriter magazine, 6, 1981, pp.23-25.
4. ^ DVD documentaries: The Winner Takes It All (2002) and Super Troupers
(2004)
5. ^ ABBA: Curious Facts. Music Stars. The Biography Channel. Retrieved on
2006-09-23.
6. ^ [1] ABBA's last known appearance (1999)
7. ^ Release dates for Mamma Mia (2008) IMDB
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