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A*Teens
http://wn.com/A*Teens -
Agnetha Fältskog
Agnetha Åse Fältskog () (born 5 April 1950) is a Swedish recording artist and entertainer. She became a household name in Sweden after the release of her début album Agnetha Fältskog in 1968, and reached international stardom as a member of pop group ABBA, which sold over 375 million records worldwide, making them the second best–selling band in history and the best–selling pop band in history.
http://wn.com/Agnetha_Fältskog -
Alain Boublil
Alain Boublil (born in Tunisia in 1941) is a librettist, best known for his collaborations with the composer Claude-Michel Schönberg.
http://wn.com/Alain_Boublil -
Anders Ekborg
Anders Ekborg (born 9 October 1960) is a Swedish actor and singer who has performed the roles of Karl Oscar in Kristina från Duvemåla and Freddie Trumper in Chess, two musicals that were written by former ABBA members Benny Andersson and Björn Ulvaeus. He has also acted in many Swedish-language versions of musicals, such as Jekyll and Hyde, Evita and Jesus Christ Superstar.
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Anne Sofie von Otter
Anne Sofie von Otter (born 9 May 1955) is a Swedish mezzo-soprano.
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Anne-Marie David
Anne-Marie David (born 23 May 1952) is a French singer. She has the rare, although not unique, distinction of having represented two different countries at the Eurovision Song Contest, with considerable success on both occasions.
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B. A. Robertson
B. A. Robertson (born Brian Alexander Robertson, 12 September 1956, Glasgow) is a Scottish musician, actor, composer and songwriter.
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Barbra Streisand
Barbra Streisand ( ; born Barbara Joan Streisand, April 24, 1942) is an American singer, actress, director, and songwriter. She has won two Academy Awards, eight Grammy Awards, four Emmy Awards, a Special Tony Award, an American Film Institute award, and a Peabody Award.
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Bee Gees
The Bee Gees
http://wn.com/Bee_Gees -
Benny Andersson
Göran Bror "Benny" Andersson (born in Stockholm, Sweden on 16 December 1946) is a Swedish musician, composer, a former member of the Swedish musical group ABBA (1972–1982), and co-composer of the musicals Chess, Kristina från Duvemåla, and Mamma Mia!. He is currently active with his own band Benny Anderssons Orkester (BAO!), and was executive producer for the film version of the musical Mamma Mia!.
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Björn Ulvaeus
Björn Kristian Ulvaeus (, born 25 April 1945) is a Swedish musician, composer, a former member of the Swedish musical group ABBA (1972–82), and co-composer of the musicals Chess, Kristina från Duvemåla, and Mamma Mia!. He has recently coproduced the film Mamma Mia! with ex-ABBA member and close-friend Benny Andersson. During the last years, Björn Ulvaeus has stepped forward as a frontline critic against the free file sharing of copyrighted material on the internet. He is also a prominent and outspoken member of the International Humanist and Ethical Union's Swedish member organisation Humanisterna.
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Blancmange (band)
Blancmange are a British synthpop band that came to prominence with a string of hits in the early- to mid-1980s.
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Brigitte Bardot
Brigitte Anne-Marie Bardot (, ; born 28 September 1934) is a French animal rights activist and a former fashion model, actress and singer.
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Cameron Mackintosh
Sir Cameron Anthony Mackintosh (born 17 October 1946) is a British theatrical producer notable for his association with many commercially successful musicals. At the height of his success in 1990, he was described as being "the most successful, influential and powerful theatrical producer in the world" by the New York Times. He is the producer of such shows as Les Misérables, The Phantom of the Opera, Mary Poppins and Martin Guerre.
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Cassandra
In Greek mythology, Cassandra (, "she who entangles men", also known as Alexandra) was the daughter of King Priam and Queen Hecuba of Troy. Her beauty caused Apollo to grant her the gift of prophecy. In an alternative version, she spent a night at Apollo's temple, at which time the temple snakes licked her ears clean so that she was able to hear the future. This is a recurring theme in Greek mythology, though sometimes it brings an ability to understand the language of animals rather than an ability to know the future. However, when she did not return his love, Apollo placed a curse on her so that no one would ever believe her predictions. She is a figure both of the epic tradition and of tragedy, where her combination of deep understanding and powerlessness exemplify the tragic condition of humankind.
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Cher
Cher (; born Cherilyn Sarkisian on May 20, 1946) is an American recording artist, actress, director and record producer. Referred to as the Goddess of Pop, she has won an Academy Award, a Grammy Award, an Emmy Award, three Golden Globes, a Cannes Film Festival Award and a People's Choice Award for her work in film, music and television.
http://wn.com/Cher -
Chuck Klosterman
Charles John "Chuck" Klosterman (born June 5, 1972) is an American journalist who has written for The New York Times Magazine, The Believer, and The Washington Post, and has written books focusing on American popular culture.
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David Wood (actor)
David Wood OBE (born 21 February 1944 in Sutton, Surrey, England) is an English-born actor and writer, called "the National Children's Dramatist" by The Times.
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Dick Cavett
Richard Alva "Dick" Cavett (born November 19, 1936) is a former American television talk show host known for his conversational style and in-depth discussion of issues. Cavett appeared regularly on nationally broadcast television in the United States in five consecutive decades, the 1960s through the 2000s.
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Don Black (lyricist)
Don Black, OBE (born 21 June 1938) is an English lyricist. His works have included numerous musicals, movie themes and hit songs. He has provided lyrics for John Barry, Charles Strouse, Andrew Lloyd Webber, Quincy Jones, Jule Styne, Henry Mancini, Michael Jackson, Elmer Bernstein, Michel Legrand, A. R. Rahman and Marvin Hamlisch.
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Elaine Paige
Elaine Paige OBE (née Bickerstaff; born 5 March 1948) is an English singer and actress best known for her work in musical theatre. Raised in Barnet, North London, Paige attended the Aida Foster stage school and made her first professional appearance on stage in 1964, at the age of 16. Her appearance in the 1968 production of Hair marked her West End debut.
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Evan Dando
Evan Griffith Dando (born March 4, 1967) is an American musician, most famous for fronting the alternative rock band The Lemonheads. He is the only original member left in the current Lemonheads line-up, having served as lead singer since the band's original formation in 1986. He was married to English fashion model Elizabeth Moses until separating in 2010.
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Helen Sjöholm
Marie Helen Sjöholm () (born 10 July 1970) is a Swedish singer, actress and musical theatre performer who lives in Gamla Enskede in Stockholm. She grew up in Sundsvall and started to sing in choirs at an early age, working, among others, with Swedish conductor Kjell Lönnå. By the end of the 1980s she toured with the group "Just For Fun".
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Hep Stars
The Hep Stars was a Swedish rock group, formed in 1963. The group were among the most successful of 1960s Swedish pop groups. After the group's first single Kana Kapila (1964) the original keyboardist Hans Östlund left the group and was replaced by Benny Andersson, who went on to become a member of ABBA. The other members of the group included Svenne Hedlund on lead vocals, Janne Frisk on guitar, Christer Pettersson (died 2006) on drums and Lelle Hegland on bass. In the late 60s Svenne Hedlund's wife, the American singer Charlotte "Lotta" Walker (born in 1944) occasionally joined the group.
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Jon Lord
Jon Douglas Lord (born 9 June 1941) is an English composer, pianist, and Hammond organ player.
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Julian Lennon
John Charles Julian Lennon (born 8 April 1963) is an English musician, songwriter, and photographer. He is also the first of John Lennon's two sons and only child of Lennon's first marriage to Cynthia Powell, with Beatles' manager Brian Epstein as godfather. He was named after John Lennon's late mother, Julia.
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Lars Berghagen
http://wn.com/Lars_Berghagen -
Lasse Berghagen
Lars "Lasse" Nils Berghagen (born 13 May 1945 in Enskede) is a Swedish singer, songwriter, composer and actor.
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Lasse Hallström
Lars Sven "Lasse" Hallström (born 2 June 1946) is a Swedish film director. He was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Director for My Life as a Dog (Mitt liv som hund) (1985) and later for The Cider House Rules (1999).
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Malcolm Fraser
John Malcolm Fraser AC, CH, GCL (; born 21 May 1930) is a former Australian Liberal Party politician who was the 22nd Prime Minister of Australia. He came to power in the 1975 election following the dismissal of the Whitlam Labor government, in which he played a key role. After three election victories, he was defeated by Bob Hawke in the 1983 election and ended his career alienated from his own party.
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Mary Magdalene
Mary Magdalene or Mary of Magdala (original Greek Μαρία ἡ Μαγδαληνή) is described, in the New Testament, as one of the most important women in the movement of Jesus throughout his ministry.
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Mireille Mathieu
Mireille Mathieu () (born July 22, 1946) is a French chanteuse, and pop singer. Hailed as the successor to Édith Piaf, she has achieved great commercial success since the 1960s. She has recorded over 1200 songs in nine different languages, and sold more than 120 million records worldwide.
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Murray Head
Murray Seafield Saint-George Head (born 5 March 1946) is a British actor and singer, most recognised for his international hit song, "One Night in Bangkok" and his album ''Say It Ain't So''. He has been involved in several projects since the 1960s and continues to record music and make appearances on television either as himself or as a character actor.
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Neil Sedaka
Neil Sedaka (born March 13, 1939) is an American pop singer, pianist, and songwriter. His career has spanned over 50 years, during which time he has written many songs for himself and others, often working with lyricists Howard Greenfield and Phil Cody.
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Noel Edmonds
Noel Ernest Edmonds, DL (born 22 December 1948) is a British broadcaster and executive, who made his name as a DJ on BBC Radio 1 in the UK. He has presented many light entertainment television programmes, including Multi-Coloured Swap Shop, Top of the Pops, The Late, Late Breakfast Show and ''Noel's House Party. He currently presents the Channel 4 gameshow Deal or No Deal'', the Sunday edition of Sky One's Are You Smarter Than A Ten Year Old? and the new topical Sky 1 show, ''Noel's HQ''.
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Olivia Newton-John
Olivia Newton-John AO, OBE (born 26 September 1948) is an English-born, Australian-raised singer and actress. She is a four-time Grammy award winner who has amassed five No. 1 and ten other Top Ten Billboard Hot 100 singles and two No. 1 Billboard 200 solo albums. Eleven of her singles (including two platinum) and 14 of her albums (including two platinum and four double platinum) have been certified gold by the RIAA. Her music has been successful in multiple formats including pop, country and adult contemporary. She co-starred with John Travolta in the film adaptation of the Broadway musical Grease which became one of the most successful films and movie soundtracks in Hollywood history.
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Peter Cetera
Peter Paul Cetera (born September 13, 1944, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.) is an American singer, songwriter, bass guitar player and producer best known for being an original member of the rock band Chicago, before launching a successful solo career. As a solo artist Cetera has scored five Top 40 singles, including two that reached number 1 on Billboard's Hot 100 chart.
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Phil Collins
Philip David Charles "Phil" Collins, LVO (born 30 January 1951) is an English singer-songwriter, drummer, keyboardist and actor best known as a drummer and vocalist for English progressive rock group Genesis and as a solo artist.
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Ramones
The Ramones were an American rock band that formed in Forest Hills, Queens, New York in 1974, often cited as the first punk rock group. Despite achieving only limited commercial success, the band was a major influence on the punk rock movement both in the United States and the United Kingdom.
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Richard Daniel Roman
Richard Daniel Roman (born 16 March 1965) is a British songwriter, composer, singer, record producer, photographer, mystic, poet and Actor best known for his work with major pop artists.
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Rik Mayall
Richard Michael "Rik" Mayall (born 7 March 1958) is an English actor, writer and comedian. He is best known for his comedy partnership with Adrian Edmondson, his over the top, energetic portrayal of characters, and for being one of the pioneering members of the alternative comedy scene in the early 1980s.
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Robert Plant
Robert Anthony Plant, CBE (born 20 August 1948), is an English rock singer and songwriter, best known as the lead vocalist and lyricist of the rock band Led Zeppelin. He has also had a successful solo career. In 2007, Plant released Raising Sand, an album produced by T-Bone Burnett with American bluegrass soprano Alison Krauss, which won the 2009 Grammy Award for Album of the Year.
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Robin Gibb
Robin Hugh Gibb, CBE (born 22 December 1949) is a singer and songwriter. He is best known as a member of the Bee Gees, co-founded with his twin brother Maurice (1949–2003), and elder brother Barry.
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Roy Andersson
Roy Andersson (born 31 March 1943) is a Swedish film director, best known for his films A Swedish Love Story and Songs from the Second Floor. More than any other, Songs from the Second Floor succeeded in cementing his personal style — a style characterized by long takes, absurdist comedy, stiff caricaturing of Swedish culture and Felliniesque grotesque. He has spent much of his professional life working on advertisement spots, directing over 400 commercials and two short films, but only directing four feature-length films in three decades. His latest film is You, the Living from 2007.
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Sarah Brightman
Sarah Brightman (born 14 August 1960) is an English classical crossover soprano, actress, songwriter and dancer. She began her career as a member of the dance troupes Pan's People and Hot Gossip and released several disco singles as a solo performer. In 1981, she made her musical theatre debut in Cats and met composer Andrew Lloyd Webber, whom she married. She went on to star in several Broadway musicals including The Phantom of the Opera, where she played the role of Christine Daaé.
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Sinéad O'Connor
'''Sinéad Marie Bernadette O'Connor' (; born 8 December 1966) is an Irish singer-songwriter. She rose to fame in the late 1980s with her debut album The Lion and the Cobra'' and achieved worldwide success in 1990 with a cover of the song "Nothing Compares 2 U".
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Sissela Kyle
'Sissela Maria Kyle' (born March 17, 1957 in Örgryte, Gothenburg, Sweden) is a Swedish actress and comedian.
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Stephen Gately
Stephen Patrick David Gately (17 March 1976 – 10 October 2009) was an Irish pop singer–songwriter, actor, dancer, musician and author, who, with Ronan Keating, was one of two lead singers of the pop group Boyzone. All of Boyzone's studio albums hit number one in the United Kingdom, their third and last being their most successful internationally. With Boyzone Gately had a record-breaking sixteen consecutive singles enter the top five of the UK Singles Chart. He performed for millions of fans globally. He released a solo album in 2000, after the group's initial breakup, which charted in the UK top ten and yielded three UK hit singles, including the top three hit "New Beginning". Gately went on to appear variously in stage productions and on television programmes as well as contributing songs to various projects. In 2008, he rejoined his colleagues as Boyzone reformed for a series of concerts and recordings.
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Steve Lillywhite
Steve Lillywhite (born 1955) is an English Grammy Award winning record producer. From his early work with Ultravox in 1976 through to the present day, Lillywhite has produced a variety of musicians including U2, Dave Matthews Band, Joan Armatrading, Darius Danesh, Big Country, The Pogues and The Smiths, through to Beady Eye and Evanescence in recent times.
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Steven Wilson
Steven John Wilson (born 3 November 1967) is a British musician, best known as the founder, lead guitarist, singer and songwriter of progressive rock band Porcupine Tree. He is involved in many other bands and musical projects both as musician and producer (including No-Man and Blackfield) and also maintains a solo career.
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Stig Anderson
'''Stig 'Stikkan' Erik Leopold Anderson (né Andersson)''' (25 January 1931 – 12 September 1997) was born in Hova, Sweden, and is best known as the manager of the pop group ABBA.
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Tanita Tikaram
Tanita Tikaram (born 12 August 1969, Münster, Germany) is a British pop/folk singer-songwriter, best known for the hits "Twist in My Sobriety" and "Good Tradition" from her 1988 debut album, Ancient Heart.
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The Hep Stars
http://wn.com/The_Hep_Stars -
Tom Dowd
Tom Dowd (October 20, 1925 – October 27, 2002) was an American recording engineer and producer for Atlantic Records. He was credited with innovating the multi-track recording method. Dowd worked on a virtual "who's who" of recordings that encompassed blues, jazz, pop, rock and soul records.
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Tommy Körberg
Tommy Körberg () (Norsjö, 4 July 1948) is a Swedish singer, actor, and musician. In 1969, he won Swedish Recording Industry Award Grammis in a category Best Debut Performance. English-speaking audiences know him best for his role in the Benny Andersson–Björn Ulvaeus–Tim Rice musical Chess. He was the first to play the role of "The Russian" on the 1984 concept album Chess, and performed the same role on stage in the 1986 world première West End production in London, for which he was nominated for Laurence Olivier Award in category Outstanding Performance by an Actor in a Musical.
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Viktoria Tolstoy
Louise Viktoria Tolstoy (born Louise Viktoria Kjellberg July 29, 1974 in Sigtuna Municipality, Stockholm County) is a Swedish jazz singer. She is the daughter of Erik Kjellberg, and the great-great-granddaughter of writer Leo Tolstoy.
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Whitney Houston
Whitney Elizabeth Houston (born August 9, 1963) is an American R&B;/Pop singer, actress, and former fashion model. A relative of several soul singers, including her mother Cissy Houston, cousins Dionne Warwick and Dee Dee Warwick, and close family friend Aretha Franklin, Houston began singing at her New Jersey church as a member of a junior gospel choir at age eleven. After she began performing alongside her mother at night clubs in the New York City area, she was discovered by Arista Records label head Clive Davis. Houston has released studio albums and movie soundtrack albums throughout her career, all of which have had diamond, multi-platinum, platinum, or gold certification.
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Yngwie Malmsteen
Yngwie Johann Malmsteen ( ; born June 30, 1963) is a Swedish guitarist, composer, multi-instrumentalist and bandleader. Malmsteen became famous and very influential for his neo-classical approach in heavy metal music. He is often considered one of the most talented rock guitarists of all time and is considered to be a pioneer of shred guitar.
http://wn.com/Yngwie_Malmsteen
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ABBA the Museum is the planned official museum of the Swedish pop group ABBA, located in Stockholm, Sweden. The museum is currently under construction with an original scheduled opening of spring 2009 that has been delayed to 2010.
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Amsterdam (; Dutch ) is the capital and largest city of the Netherlands, with an urban population of 1,364,422 and a metropolitan population of 2,158,372. The city is located in the province of North Holland in the west of the country. It comprises the northern part of the Randstad, the sixth-largest metropolitan area in Europe, with a population of approximately 6.7 million.
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Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic (, ), is the second largest country in South America, constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires. It is the eighth-largest country in the world by land area and the largest among Spanish-speaking nations, though Mexico, Colombia and Spain are more populous.
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BBC 6 Music is one of the BBC's digital radio stations, was launched on 11 March 2002 and originally codenamed Network Y. It was the first national music radio station to be launched by the BBC in 32 years.
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Berlin (; ) is the capital city of Germany and one of sixteen states of Germany. With a population of 3.4 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the eighth most populous urban area in the European Union. Located in northeastern Germany, it is the center of the Berlin-Brandenburg Metropolitan Area, comprising 5 million people from over 190 nations. Geographically embedded in the European Plains, Berlin is influenced by a temperate seasonal climate. Around one third of the city's territory is composed of forests, parks, gardens, rivers and lakes.
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Birmingham ( , locally ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the West Midlands county of England. It is the most populous British city outside London with a population of 1,028,700 (2009 estimate), and lies at the heart of the West Midlands conurbation, the United Kingdom's second most populous Urban Area with a population of 2,284,093 (2001 census). Birmingham's metropolitan area, which includes surrounding towns to which it is closely tied through commuting, is also the United Kingdom's second most populous with a population of 3,683,000.
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Copenhagen (, , , or ; or ) is the capital and largest city of Denmark, with an urban population of 1,181,239 (2010) and a metropolitan population of 1,894,521 (2010). Copenhagen is situated on the islands of Zealand and Amager. With around 2.7 million inhabitants within a 50 km radius, Copenhagen is one of the most densely populated areas in Northern Europe.
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Criteria Studios is a music-recording studio in Miami, Florida, started in 1958 by Mack Emerman.
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Cyprus (; , Kýpros, ; ), – officially the Republic of Cyprus (, Kypriakī́ Dīmokratía, ; ) – is a Eurasian island country in the Eastern Mediterranean, south of Turkey and west of Syria and Lebanon. It is the third largest island in the Mediterranean Sea and one of its most popular tourist destinations. An advanced, high-income economy with a very high Human Development Index, the Republic of Cyprus was a founding member of the Non-Aligned Movement until it joined the European Union on 1 May 2004.
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Edmonton () is the capital of the Canadian province of Alberta. The city is located on the North Saskatchewan River in the central region of the province, an area with some of the most fertile farmland on the prairies. It is the second largest city in Alberta after Calgary, and is the hub of Canada's sixth-largest census metropolitan area.
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Gothenburg (; pronounced ) is the second-largest city in Sweden (after Stockholm) and the fifth-largest in the Nordic countries. Situated on the southwest coast of Sweden, the city proper has a population of 509,847, with 510,491 in the urban area and total of 922,938 inhabitants in the metropolitan area.
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Hamburg (; , local pronunciation Low German/Low Saxon: Hamborg ) is the second-largest city in Germany and the eighth-largest city in the European Union. The city is home to over 1.8 million people, while the Hamburg Metropolitan Region (including parts of the neighboring Federal States of Lower Saxony and Schleswig-Holstein) has more than 4.3 million inhabitants. The port of Hamburg is the third-largest port in Europe (third to Port of Antwerp and Rotterdam), and the eighth largest in the world.
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Hova is a locality and one of the two seats of Gullspång Municipality, Västra Götaland County, Sweden, the other is Gullspång. It had 1,375 inhabitants in 2005.
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Jönköping () (yan-SHO-ping) is a city in southern Sweden with 84,420 inhabitants in 2005. It is the 9th most populous city of Sweden.
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Malmö (), in the southernmost province of Scania, is the third most populous city in Sweden after Stockholm and Gothenburg.
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Manchester () is a city and metropolitan borough of Greater Manchester, England. In 2009, the population of the city was estimated to be 483,800, making it the seventh-most populous local authority district in England. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas; the metropolitan county of Greater Manchester had an estimated population of 2,600,100, the Greater Manchester Urban Area a population of 2,240,230, and the Larger Urban Zone around Manchester, the second-most-populous in the UK, had an estimated population in the 2004 Urban Audit of 2,539,100. The demonym of Manchester is Mancunian.
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Mexico, (pronounced ; ), officially known as the United Mexican States (), is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of Mexico. Covering almost 2 million square kilometres (over 760,000 sq mi), Mexico is the fifth-largest country in the Americas by total area and the 14th largest independent nation in the world. With an estimated population of 111 million, it is the 11th most populous country and the most populous Hispanophone country on Earth. Mexico is a federation comprising thirty-one states and a Federal District, the capital city.
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Nassau is the capital, largest city, and commercial centre of the Commonwealth of The Bahamas. The city has a population of 260,000 (2008 census), nearly 80 percent of the entire population of The Bahamas (330,000). Lynden Pindling International Airport, the major airport for The Bahamas, is located about west of Nassau city centre, and has daily flights to major cities in the United Kingdom, United States, Canada and the Caribbean. The city is located on the island of New Providence, which functions much like a federal district. While there is no local government, it is governed directly as an administrative division of the national government. Nassau is considered a historical stronghold of pirates.
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Norway (; Norwegian: (Bokmål) or (Nynorsk)), officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe occupying the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, as well as Jan Mayen and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.8 million. It is one of the most sparsely populated countries in Europe. The majority of the country shares a border to the east with Sweden; its northernmost region is bordered by Finland to the south and Russia to the east; and Denmark lies south of its southern tip across the Skagerrak Strait. The capital city of Norway is Oslo. Norway's extensive coastline, facing the North Atlantic Ocean and the Barents Sea, is home to its famous fjords.
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Oslo ( or ) is the capital and largest city in Norway. Founded around 1048 by King Harald III "Hardrada" of Norway, the city was largely destroyed by a fire in 1624. The Danish–Norwegian king Christian IV rebuilt the city as Christiania (briefly also spelt Kristiania). In 1925 the city reclaimed its original Norwegian name, Oslo. The diocese of Oslo is one of the five original dioceses in Norway, which originated around the year 1070.
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Stockholm () is the capital and the largest city of Sweden. It is the site of the national Swedish government, the Riksdag (parliament), and the official residence of the Swedish monarch as well as the prime minister. Since 1980, the monarch has resided at Drottningholm Palace outside of Stockholm and uses the Royal Palace of Stockholm as his workplace and official residence. As of 2009, the Stockholm metropolitan area is home to approximately 22% of Sweden's population. Stockholm is the most populous city in Sweden with a population of 829,417 in the municipality (2009), 1.25 million in the urban area (2005), and 2 million in the 6650 km² large metropolitan area (2009).
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Sweden (pronounced , ), officially the Kingdom of Sweden (Swedish: ), is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden has land borders with Norway to the west and Finland to the northeast, and water borders with Denmark, Germany, and Poland to the south, and Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Russia to the east. Sweden is also connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund.
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The Swiss Alps (, , , ) are the portion of the Alps mountain range that lies within Switzerland. Because of their central position within the entire Alpine range, they are also known as the Central Alps.
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Västervik is a city and the seat of Västervik Municipality, Kalmar County, Sweden with 20,694 inhabitants in 2005.
http://wn.com/Västervik
- 2nd Best to None
- a cappella
- A*Teens
- AAMI Stadium
- ABBA (album)
- ABBA Live
- Abba Seafood
- ABBA the Museum
- Abba-esque
- Abbacadabra
- Abbaesque
- ABBAmania
- Abbasalutely
- Adelaide, Australia
- Agnetha Fältskog
- Ainbusk
- Alain Boublil
- Amsterdam
- Anders Ekborg
- Angeleyes
- Anne Sofie von Otter
- Anne-Marie David
- Anni-Frid Lyngstad
- Antwerp
- Apple Corps
- Argentina
- ARIA Charts
- Arrival
- Arrival (ABBA album)
- Arrival (song)
- Atlantic Records
- B. A. Robertson
- Ballangen
- BAO 3
- Barbara Dickson
- Barbra Streisand
- Barry Gibb
- BBC 6 Music
- Bee Gees
- Belle
- Benny Andersson
- Berlin
- Billboard 200
- Billboard Hot 100
- Birmingham
- Björn Again
- Björn Ulvaeus
- Blancmange (band)
- BRAVO
- Brigitte Bardot
- BRIT Awards
- Broadway theater
- Cameron Mackintosh
- Canadian Hot 100
- Cashbox (magazine)
- Cassandra
- Cher
- Chess (musical)
- Chiquitita
- Chocolat (2000 film)
- Chuck Klosterman
- Claes af Geijerstam
- Cologne
- Connie Francis
- Copenhagen
- copyright
- cover band
- cover version
- Creem
- Creem (magazine)
- Criteria Studios
- cult films
- Cyprus
- Dancing Queen
- Daniel Balavoine
- David Wood (actor)
- Deep Purple
- Dick Cavett
- Ding-A-Dong
- disco
- Disques Vogue
- Djupa andetag
- Don Black (lyricist)
- Duke (album)
- Eagle (song)
- Eddie the Head
- Edmonton
- Edmonton Journal
- Elaine Paige
- embargo
- EMI
- Epic Records
- Erasure
- Essen
- Euro disco
- europop
- Eurovision
- Evan Dando
- Extended play
- Fear of flying
- Fernando (song)
- folk music
- folkpark
- Frida (album)
- Frida - The DVD
- Frida 1967-1972
- Frida Ensam
- Frida the dvd
- Gabba (band)
- Genesis (band)
- glam rock
- Glasgow, Scotland
- Gothenburg
- Gröna Lund
- Hamburg
- Hanover
- Helen Sjöholm
- Hep Stars
- Hey Jude
- Honey, Honey
- Hootenanny Singers
- Hot Dance Club Play
- Hova, Sweden
- I Know Him So Well
- Iron Maiden
- Jehovah's Witness
- Jennie, Jennie
- Jon Lord
- Josefin Nilsson
- Julian Lennon
- Jönköping
- Klinga mina klockor
- Lars Berghagen
- Lasse Berghagen
- Lasse Hallström
- Latin pop
- Led Zeppelin
- Life magazine
- Los Angeles Times
- Lycka
- lymphoma
- Malcolm Fraser
- Malmö
- Mamma Mia (song)
- Mamma Mia!
- Mamma Mia! (film)
- Mamma Mia! The Movie
- Manchester
- Maple Leaf Gardens
- Mary Magdalene
- Melbourne Town Hall
- Melbourne, Australia
- Melodifestivalen
- Melody Maker
- Mexico
- Michael B. Tretow
- Mireille Mathieu
- Money, Money, Money
- msnbc
- Muriel's Wedding
- Murray Head
- Music of Sweden
- My Colouring Book
- My Life as a Dog
- Nassau, Bahamas
- National (brand)
- Neil Sedaka
- News Gothic
- Nippon Budokan
- NME
- Noel Edmonds
- Norway
- Nova (Swedish band)
- Olivia Newton-John
- One Night in Bangkok
- one-hit wonder
- Oslo
- Panasonic
- People Need Love
- Peter Cetera
- Phil Collins
- Playboy Records
- PlayStation 2
- PlayStation 3
- Polar Music
- Polydor Records
- PolyGram
- Pop music
- Pop rock
- PRS for Music
- Ramones
- RCA Records
- Record World
- recording engineer
- registered trademark
- Rexall Place
- RIAA
- RIANZ
- Richard Daniel Roman
- Rik Mayall
- Ring Ring (album)
- Ring Ring (song)
- Robert Plant
- Robin Gibb
- Roy Andersson
- Royal Albert Hall
- RPM
- Sarah Brightman
- Saturday Superstore
- schlager
- Shapes (album)
- Shine (Frida album)
- SingStar
- Sinéad O'Connor
- Sissela Kyle
- skiffle
- Something's Going On
- SOS (ABBA song)
- Soviet ruble
- Stephen Gately
- Steve Lillywhite
- Steven Wilson
- Stig Anderson
- Stockholm
- Summer Night City
- Sunday Telegraph
- Super Trouper (song)
- Svensktoppen
- Sveriges Television
- Sweden
- Swiss Alps
- synthpop
- Take a Chance on Me
- Tanita Tikaram
- Teach-In
- The Beatles
- The Hep Stars
- The Lemonheads
- The Local
- The Name of the Game
- The Real Group
- Tim Rice
- Tom Dowd
- Tommy Körberg
- tribute band
- Tu te reconnaîtras
- U2
- UK Singles Chart
- Under Attack
- Universal Records
- Variety (magazine)
- Viktoria Tolstoy
- Voulez-Vous
- Voulez-Vous (song)
- Västervik
- wall of sound
- Waterloo (ABBA song)
- Waterloo (album)
- Wembley Arena
- Whitney Houston
- Winter Symphony
- Yngwie Malmsteen
- You're Summer
Abba Filmography
ABBA
Releases by album:
Voulez-Vous |
Waterloo |
The Album |
The Visitors |
Arrival |
ABBA |
Ring Ring |
The Movie |
Super Trouper |
Album releases
Voulez-Vous
(Released 2010)
-
As Good as New
-
Voulez-Vous
-
I Have a Dream
-
Angel Eyes
-
The King Has Lost His Crown
-
Does Your Mother Know
-
If It Wasn't for the Nights
-
Chiquitita
-
Lovers (Live a Little Longer)
-
Kisses of Fire
-
Summer Night City
-
Lovelight
-
Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (A Man After Midnight)
-
Dream World
-
Voulez-Vous
Waterloo
(Released 2008)
-
Waterloo
-
Sitting in the Palmtree
-
King Kong Song
-
Hasta mañana
-
My Mama Said
-
Dance (While the Music Still Goes On)
-
Honey, Honey
-
What About Livingstone
-
Watch Out
-
Gonna Sing You My Lovesong
-
Suzy-Hang-Around
The Album
(Released 2008)
-
Eagle
-
Take a Chance on Me
-
One Man, One Woman
-
The Name of the Game
-
Move On
-
Hole in Your Soul
-
Thank You for the Music
-
I Wonder (Departure)
-
I'm a Marionette
The Visitors
(Released 2008)
-
The Visitors
-
Head Over Heels
-
When All Is Said and Done
-
Soldiers
-
I Let the Music Speak
-
One of Us
-
Two for the Price of One
-
Slipping Through My Fingers
-
Like an Angel Passing Through My Room
Arrival
(Released 2008)
-
When I Kissed the Teacher
-
Dancing Queen
-
My Love, My Life
-
Dum Dum Diddle
-
Knowing Me, Knowing You
-
Money, Money, Money
-
That's Me
-
Why Did It Have to Be Me
-
Tiger
-
Arrival
ABBA
(Released 2008)
-
Mamma Mia
-
Hey, Hey Helen
-
Tropical Loveland
-
S.O.S.
-
Man in the Middle
-
Bang-A-Boomerang
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I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do
-
Rock Me
-
Intermezzo No. 1
-
I've Been Waiting for You
-
So Long
Ring Ring
(Released 2008)
-
Ring Ring
-
Another Town, Another Train
-
Disillusion
-
People Need Love
-
I Saw It in the Mirror
-
Nina, Pretty Ballerina
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Love Isn't Easy (But It Sure Is Hard Enough)
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Me and Bobby and Bobby's Brother
-
He Is Your Brother
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She's My Kind of Girl
-
I Am Just a Girl
-
Rock 'n' Roll Band
The Movie
-
Please Change Your Mind
-
Hole in Your Soul
-
Tiger
-
S.O.S.
-
Money, Money, Money
-
He Is Your Brother
-
Intermezzo No. 1
-
Waterloo
-
Mamma Mia
-
Swedish Polka
-
Rock Me
-
I've Been Waiting for You
-
The Name of the Game
-
Ring, Ring
-
Why Did It Have to Be Me
-
When I Kissed the Teacher
-
Get on the Carousel
-
I'm a Marionette
-
Fernando
-
Dancing Queen
-
So Long
-
Eagle
-
Thank You for the Music
-
Ring, Ring (reprise)
Super Trouper
-
Super Trouper
-
The Winner Takes It All
-
On and On and On
-
Andante, andante
-
Me and I
-
Happy New Year
-
Our Last Summer
-
The Piper
-
Lay All Your Love on Me
-
The Way Old Friends Do
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 3:31
- Published: 31 Oct 2006
- Uploaded: 26 Oct 2011
- Author: goverthana
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 7:59
- Published: 08 Sep 2007
- Uploaded: 27 Oct 2011
- Author: swissprincess1974
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 4:19
- Published: 06 Jan 2008
- Uploaded: 27 Oct 2011
- Author: agnetha4ever
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 2:46
- Published: 06 May 2009
- Uploaded: 26 Oct 2011
- Author: Festfolket
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 4:06
- Published: 31 Dec 2007
- Uploaded: 26 Oct 2011
- Author: abbafanglosuk
size: 1.2Kb
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-
Forget Embassy Wars, the Real War Is Over Memory
WorldNews.com
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Iran files complaint over purported US drone
Al Jazeera
-
Russians stage mass protests against Putin, polls
The Star
-
Defense Authorization Act Will Destroy The Bill Of Rights
WorldNews.com
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Euro crisis summit: The night Europe changed
BBC News
- (I Am) The Seeker
- 2nd Best to None
- a cappella
- A*Teens
- AAMI Stadium
- ABBA (album)
- ABBA Live
- Abba Seafood
- ABBA the Museum
- Abba-esque
- Abbacadabra
- Abbaesque
- ABBAmania
- Abbasalutely
- Adelaide, Australia
- Agnetha Fältskog
- Ainbusk
- Alain Boublil
- Amsterdam
- Anders Ekborg
- Angeleyes
- Anne Sofie von Otter
- Anne-Marie David
- Anni-Frid Lyngstad
- Antwerp
- Apple Corps
- Argentina
- ARIA Charts
- Arrival
- Arrival (ABBA album)
- Arrival (song)
- Atlantic Records
- B. A. Robertson
- Ballangen
- BAO 3
- Barbara Dickson
- Barbra Streisand
- Barry Gibb
- BBC 6 Music
- Bee Gees
- Belle
- Benny Andersson
- Berlin
- Billboard 200
- Billboard Hot 100
- Birmingham
- Björn Again
- Björn Ulvaeus
- Blancmange (band)
- BRAVO
- Brigitte Bardot
- BRIT Awards
- Broadway theater
- Cameron Mackintosh
- Canadian Hot 100
- Cashbox (magazine)
- Cassandra
- Cher
- Chess (musical)
- Chiquitita
size: 0.7Kb
size: 0.8Kb
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name | ABBA |
---|---|
background | group_or_band |
alias | AgnethaBjörnBennyAnni-Frid |
origin | Stockholm, Sweden |
genre | Pop rock, Euro disco, europop, synthpop |
years active | 1972–1982 |
label | Polar (Sweden)Polydor(Germany/The Netherlands)Atlantic (United States/Canada)Universal (USA)Epic (UK/Italy)Vogue (France)DiscomateRCA (Australia/South America/Mexico)PolyGramCarnabySunshine (Rhodesia-Zimbabwe)Ariston/Dig It (Italy) |
associated acts | Hep Stars, Hootenanny Singers, Benny Anderssons Orkester |
website | |
past members | Agnetha FältskogBjörn UlvaeusBenny AnderssonAnni-Frid Lyngstad }} |
During the band's active years, Fältskog and Ulvaeus were a married couple, as were Lyngstad and Andersson–although both couples later divorced. At the height of their popularity, both relationships were suffering strain which led ultimately to the collapse of the Ulvaeus-Fältskog marriage (in 1979) and the Andersson-Lyngstad marriage (in 1981). In the late 1970s and early 1980s these relationship changes began appearing in the group's music, as they produced more introspective lyrics with different compositions.
After ABBA broke up early 1983, Andersson and Ulvaeus achieved success writing music for the stage while Lyngstad and Fältskog pursued individual solo careers with varying success. ABBA's music declined in popularity until several films, notably Muriel's Wedding and The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, revived interest in the group, spawning several tribute bands. In 1999, ABBA's music was adapted into the successful musical Mamma Mia! that toured worldwide. A film of the same name released in 2008 became the highest grossing film in the UK that year. The group was inducted into The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on 15 March 2010.
History
Before ABBA (1960s)
Benny Andersson (born 16 December 1946 in Stockholm, Sweden) became (at age 18) the member of a popular Swedish pop-rock group, The Hep Stars, that performed covers of international hits. The Hep Stars were known as "The Swedish Beatles". They also set up Hep House, their equivalent of the Apple Corps. Andersson played the keyboard and eventually started writing original compositions for his band, many of which became major hits including "No Response" that hit No. 3 in 1965, "Sunny Girl", "Wedding" & "Consolation", all of which hit No. 1 in 1966. Andersson also had a fruitful songwriting collaboration with Lasse Berghagen, with whom he composed his first Svensktoppen entry "Sagan om lilla Sofi" ("The Story of Little Sophie") in 1968.Björn Ulvaeus (born 25 April 1945 in Gothenburg, Sweden) also began his musical career at 18 (as a singer and guitarist), when he fronted The Hootenanny Singers, a popular Swedish folk-skiffle group. Ulvaeus started writing English-language songs for his group, and even had a brief solo career alongside. The Hootenanny Singers and The Hep Stars sometimes crossed paths while touring. In June 1966, Ulvaeus and Andersson decided to write a song together. Their first attempt was "Isn't It Easy to Say", a song later recorded by The Hep Stars. Stig Anderson was the manager of The Hootenanny Singers and founder of the Polar Music label. He saw potential in the collaboration, and encouraged them to compose more. Both also began playing occasionally with the other's bands on stage and on record, although not until 1969 did the pair write and produce some of their first real hits together: "Ljuva sextital" ('Merry Sixties'), recorded by Brita Borg and The Hep Stars' 1969 hit "Speleman" ("Fiddler").
Andersson wrote and submitted the song "Hej, Clown" for the 1969 Melodifestivalen, the Swedish Eurovision Song Contest. The song tied for first place, but re-voting relegated Andersson's song to second place. On that occasion Andersson briefly met his future spouse, singer Anni-Frid Lyngstad, who also participated in the contest. A month later, the two had become a couple. As their respective bands began to break up during 1969, Andersson and Ulvaeus teamed up and recorded their first album together in 1970, called Lycka ("Happiness"), which included original compositions sung by both men. Their spouses were often present in the recording studio, and sometimes added backing vocals; Fältskog even co-wrote a song with the two. Ulvaeus still occasionally recorded and performed with The Hootenanny Singers until the summer of 1974, and Andersson took part in producing their records.
Agnetha Fältskog (born 5 April 1950 in Jönköping, Sweden) had a No. 1 record in Sweden when she was 17, and was soon noted by the critics and songwriters as a talented singer/songwriter of schlager style songs. Fältskog's main inspiration in her early years were singers like Connie Francis. Along with her own compositions, she recorded covers of foreign hits and performed them on tours in Swedish folkparks. In 1967 she submitted an original song (Försonade ("Redeemed")) for Melodifestivalen, but it was rejected. She briefly met Anni-Frid Lyngstad for the first time during a TV show in January 1968, and met Björn Ulvaeus at a concert venue a few months later.
During filming of a Swedish TV special in May 1969, Fältskog met Ulvaeus again, and they were married in 1971. Fältskog and Ulvaeus eventually were involved in each other's recording sessions, and soon even Andersson and Lyngstad added backing vocals to her 1970 album Som jag är (As I Am). In 1973, Fältskog starred as Mary Magdalene in the original Swedish production of Jesus Christ Superstar and attracted favourable reviews. Between 1967 and 1975, Fältskog released five studio albums.
Anni-Frid "Frida" Lyngstad (born 15 November 1945 in Bjørkåsen in Ballangen, Norway) sang from the age of thirteen with various dance bands, and worked mainly in a jazz-oriented cabaret style. She also formed her own band, the Anni-Frid Four. In the summer of 1967, she won a national talent competition with the song "En ledig dag" ("A Day Off"), included in the EMI compilation Frida 1967-1972. The first prize was a recording contract with EMI Sweden and to perform live on the most popular TV show in Sweden. This TV performance, amongst many others, is included in the 3½ hour documentary Frida - The DVD. Lyngstad released several singles on EMI and had many hits in the Swedish charts. When Benny Andersson started to produce her recordings in 1971, she had her first No. 1 single, "Min egen stad" ("My Own Town"), for which all the future ABBA members sang the backup vocals. Lyngstad toured and performed regularly in the folkpark circuit and made appearances on radio and TV. She met Björn Ulvaeus briefly in 1963 during a talent contest, and Agnetha Fältskog during a TV show in early 1968.
Lyngstad finally linked up with her future bandmates in 1969. On 1 March 1969, she participated in the Melodifestivalen, where she met Andersson for the first time. A few weeks later they met again during a concert tour in southern Sweden and they soon became a couple. Andersson produced her single "Peter Pan" in September 1969– her first collaboration with Benny & Björn, as they had written the song. Later Andersson produced 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", a hit in Scandinavia before the English version was recorded.
First live performance and the start of "Festfolk"
An attempt at combining their talents occurred 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. Andersson and Ulvaeus were at this time recording their first album together, "Lycka", which was to be released in September 1970. Fältskog and Lyngstad added backing vocals on several tracks during June, and the idea of them working together saw them launch a stage act, "Festfolk", which translates from Swedish to mean both "Party People" and "Engaged Couples", on 1 November 1970 in Gothenburg. The cabaret show attracted generally negative reviews, except for the performance of the Andersson and Ulvaeus hit "Hej, gamle man" ("Hello, Old Man"); the first Bjorn and Benny recording to feature all four. They also performed solo numbers from respective albums, but the lukewarm reception convinced the foursome to shelve plans for working together for the time being, and each soon concentrated on individual projects again.
First record together "Hej, gamle man"
"Hej, gamle man", a song about an old Salvation Army soldier, became the quartet's first hit. The record was credited to Björn & Benny and reached number 5 on the sales charts and number 1 on Svensktoppen, staying there for 15 weeks.In the first half of 1971, the four artists worked more together, adding vocals to the others' recordings. Fältskog, Andersson and Ulvaeus toured together in May, while Lyngstad toured on her own. Frequent recording sessions brought the foursome closer together during the summer.
Forming the group (1970–1973)
After the 1970 release of "Lycka", two more singles credited to 'Björn & Benny' were released in Sweden, "Det kan ingen doktor hjälpa" ("No doctor can help with that") and "Tänk om jorden vore ung" ("Imagine if the Earth were young"), with more prominent vocals by Fältskog and Lyngstad–and moderate chart success.Fältskog released her fourth album in 1971 and married Ulvaeus on 6 July 1971. Andersson, Ulvaeus, and Fältskog started performing together on a regular basis at the Swedish folkparks during the summer of 1971.
Stig Anderson, founder and owner of Polar, was determined to break into the mainstream international market with music by Andersson and Ulvaeus. "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 Melodifestivalen, and after two rejected entries in 1971, Andersson and Ulvaeus submitted their new song "Säg det med en sång" ("Say It With A Song") for the 1972 contest, and they chose newcomer Lena Anderson to perform. The song won third place, encouraging Stig, and became a hit in Sweden.
The first signs of foreign success came as a surprise, as the Andersson and Ulvaeus single "She's My Kind of Girl" was released by Epic in Japan in March 1972, giving the duo a Top 10 hit. Two more singles were released in Japan, "En Carousel" ("En Karusell" in Scandinavia, an earlier version of "Merry-Go-Round") and "Love Has Its Ways" (a song they wrote with Koichi Morita).
First hit as 'Björn, Benny, Agnetha & Anni-Frid'
Ulvaeus and Andersson persevered with their songwriting and experimented with new sounds and vocal arrangements. "People Need Love" was released in June 1972, featuring guest vocals by the women, who were now given much greater prominence. Stig released it as a single, credited to Björn & Benny, Agnetha & Anni-Frid. The song reached No. 17 in the Swedish combined single and 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 No. 114 on the Cashbox singles chart and No. 117 on Record World's singles chart. Billed as by 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.The foursome decided to record their first album together in the autumn of 1972, and sessions began on 26 September 1972. The women shared lead vocal on "Nina, Pretty Ballerina" that day, and their voices in harmony for the first time gave the foursome an idea of the quality of their combined talents.
"Ring Ring"
For 1973, the band and their manager Stig decided to have another try at 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 Melodifestivalen, on 10 February 1973, it was placed third, and thus never reached the international Eurovision Song Contest. Nevertheless the proto-group put out their first album, called Ring Ring. The album did well and the "Ring Ring" single was a hit in many parts of Europe and also in South Africa. However, Stig Anderson felt the true breakthrough could only come with a UK or US hit.
Official naming
In early 1973, Stig Anderson, tired of unwieldy names, started to refer to the group privately and publicly as ABBA. At first, this was a play on words, as Abba is also the name of a well-known fish-canning company in Sweden, and itself an acronym. However, since the fish-canners were 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 was impressed with the names "Alibaba," "FABB," 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 rights to the name. "ABBA" is an acronym formed from the first letters of each group member's first name: Agnetha, Björn, Benny and Anni-Frid. During a promo photo, Benny turned his "B" upside-down for fun, and from 1976 onwards, the first 'B' in the logo version of the name was "mirror-image" reversed on the band's promotional material and became the group's registered trademark.The first time the name is found written on paper is on a recording session sheet from the Metronome Studio in Stockholm, dated 16 October 1973. This was first written as "Björn, Benny, Agnetha & Frida", but was subsequently crossed out with "ABBA" written in large letters on top.
The official logo, using the bold version of the News Gothic typeface, was designed by Rune Söderqvist, and appeared for the first time on the Dancing Queen single in August 1976, and subsequently on all later original albums and singles. But the idea for the official logo was made by the German photographer Wolfgang Heilemann on a "Dancing Queen" shoot for the teenage magazine BRAVO. On the photo, every ABBA-member held a giant initial letter of his/her name. After the pictures were made, Heilemann found out that one of the men held his letter backwards. They discussed it and the members of ABBA liked it. Following their acquisition of the group's catalogue, Polygram began using variations of the ABBA logo, using a different font and adding a crown emblem to it in 1992 for the first releases of 'ABBA Gold'. When Universal Music purchased Polygram (and, thus, ABBA's label Polar Music International), control of the group's catalogue was returned to Stockholm. Since then, the original logo has been reinstated on all official products.
Breakthrough (1973–1976)
Eurovision
For their first Eurovision, ABBA entered with "Ring Ring" but failed to qualify as the 1973 Swedish entry; it came third in the preliminary round. Stig immediately started planning for the 1974 contest.Ulvaeus, Andersson, and Stig believed in the possibilities of using Melodifestivalen and Eurovision TV contests as a way to make the music business aware of the band and Andersson, Ulvaeus and Stig as composers. In late 1973, they were invited by Swedish television to contribute a song for the 1974 Eurovision Song 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. Winning the Eurovision Song Contest gave ABBA the chance to tour Europe and perform on major TV shows; thus the band saw the "Waterloo" single climb the charts in many European countries. "Waterloo" was ABBA's first number one single in big markets such as the UK, Germany and Australia. In the US, it reached No. 6 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, paving the way for their first album and their first trip as a group there. Albeit a short promotional visit, it included their first performance on American TV, The Mike Douglas Show. The Waterloo album only peaked at No. 145 on the Billboard 200 album chart, but received unanimous high praise from the US critics: Los Angeles Times called it "a compelling and fascinating debut album that captures the spirit of mainstream pop quite effectively . . . an immensely enjoyable and pleasant project", while Creem characterized it as "a perfect blend of exceptional, lovable compositions".
ABBA's follow-up single, "Honey, Honey", reached No. 27 on the US Billboard Hot 100, and was No. 2 in Germany. However, in the UK, ABBA's British record company, Epic, decided to re-release a remixed version of "Ring Ring" instead of "Honey Honey", and a cover version of "Honey Honey" by the act Sweet Dreams reached No. 10. Both records debuted on the UK chart within one week of each other. "Ring Ring" failed to reach the Top 30 in the UK, increasing growing speculation that the group were simply Eurovision one-hit wonders.
Post-Eurovision
In November 1974, ABBA embarked on their first European tour, playing dates in Denmark, West Germany, and Austria. It was not as successful as the band had hoped, since most of the venues did not sell out. Due to a lack of demand, they were even forced to cancel a few shows, including a sole concert scheduled in Switzerland. The second leg of the tour, which took them through Scandinavia in January 1975, was different. They played to full houses everywhere and finally got the reception they had aimed for. Live performances continued during the summer of 1975 when ABBA embarked on a sixteen open-air date tour of Sweden and Finland. Their Stockholm show at the Gröna Lund amusement park had an estimated audience of 19,200.In 1974 So Long was released as a single in the UK but it received no airplay from Radio 1 and failed to chart. In the summer of 1975 they released "I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do", which again received little airplay on radio 1 but managed to climb the charts, to No. 38. Later in 1975 the release of their next album ABBA and single "SOS" brought back their chart presence in the UK, where the single hit No. 6 and the album reached No. 13. SOS also became ABBA's second number 1 single in both Germany and Australia. Success was further solidified with "Mamma Mia" reaching the No. 1 spot in the UK, Germany, and Australia in January 1976. In the US, "SOS" reached No. 10 on the Record World Top 100 singles chart and No. 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.
The success of the group in the United States had until that time been limited to single releases. By early 1976, the group already had four Top 30 singles on US charts, but the album market proved to be tough to crack. The eponymous ABBA album generated three American hits, but it only peaked at No. 165 on the Cashbox album chart and No. 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". The group, however, enjoyed warm reviews from American press. Cashbox went as far as saying that "there is a recurrent thread of taste and artistry inherent in Abba's marketing, creativity and presentation that makes it almost embarrassing to critique their efforts", while Creem wrote: "SOS is surrounded on this LP by so many good tunes that the mind boggles".
In Australia, the airing of the music videos for "I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do" and "Mamma Mia" on nationwide TV in August 1975 started an immense interest for ABBA, resulting in No. 1 positions on both the single and album charts for months.
Superstardom (1976–1981)
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 No. 1 album, and also took ABBA into the Top 50 on the US album charts for the first time, eventually selling more than a million copies there. At the same time, Germany released a compilation named The Very Best of ABBA, also becoming a No. 1 album there whereas the Greatest hits LP followed a few months later to No. 2 on the German charts, despite all similarities with "The Very Best" album. Also included on Greatest Hits was a new single, "Fernando", which had first been written by Ulvaeus and Andersson in Swedish for Lyngstad's No. 1 1975 solo album Frida ensam (Frida alone). After Lyngstad's huge success with the song in Sweden, the group decided to record an English version. "Fernando" took the world by storm, hitting No. 1 in at least thirteen countries worldwide, including the UK, Germany and Australia and the single went to sell over 10 million copies worldwide. In Australia, the song occupied the top position during 14 weeks, and stayed in the Australian charts for 40 weeks, tying The Beatles for longest number one for "Hey Jude", making "Fernando" one of the bestselling singles of all time in Australia. That same year, the group received its first international prize, with "Fernando" being chosen as the "Best Studio Recording of 1975". In the US, "Fernando" reached the Top 10 of the Cashbox Top 100 singles chart and No. 13 on the Billboard Hot 100. It also topped the Billboard Adult Contemporary chart, ABBA's first American number one single of any kind.The group's next album, Arrival, a No. 1 bestseller all over Europe and Australia, represented a new level of accomplishment in both songwriting and studio work, prompting rave reviews from more rock-oriented UK music weeklies such as Melody Maker and New Musical Express, and mostly appreciative notices from American critics. Hit after hit flowed from Arrival: "Money, Money, Money", another No. 1 in Germany and Australia, and "Knowing Me, Knowing You", ABBA's sixth consecutive German No. 1 as well as another UK No. 1. The real sensation was "Dancing Queen", not only topping the charts in the loyal markets UK, Germany and Australia, but also reaching No. 1 in the US. In South Africa ABBA had astounding success with "Fernando", "Dancing Queen" and "Knowing Me, Knowing You" being among the top 20 bestselling singles for 1976–77. In 1977 Arrival was nominated for the inaugural BRIT Award in the category "Best International Album of the Year". By this time ABBA were popular in the UK, most of Western Europe, Australia and New Zealand. In Frida the dvd, Lyngstad explains how she and Fältskog developed as singers, as ABBA's recordings grew more complex over the years.
Their popularity in the US would remain on a comparatively smaller scale, and "Dancing Queen" became the only Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 single ABBA had there (they did, however, get three more singles to the No. 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 No. 20 on the Billboard 200 album chart and was certified gold by RIAA.
European and Australian tour
In January 1977, ABBA hit the road. 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 Girl With The Golden Hair. " The concert attracted immense media attention from across Europe and Australia. They continued the tour through Western Europe visiting Gothenburg, Copenhagen, Berlin, Cologne, Amsterdam, Antwerp, Essen, Hanover, Hamburg, and ended it with shows in the UK in Manchester, Birmingham, Glasgow 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, enough to fill the venue 580 times. Along with praise ("Abba turn out to be amazingly successful at reproducing their records", wrote Creem), there were complaints that "Abba performed slickly...but with a zero personality coming across from a total of 16 people on stage" (Melody Maker). One of the Royal Albert Hall concerts was filmed as a reference for the filming of the Australian tour for what became ABBA: The Movie, though it is not known exactly how much of the concert was filmed.After the European leg of the tour, in March 1977, ABBA played eleven dates in Australia before a total of 160,000 people. The opening concert in Sydney at the Sydney Showground on 3 March before over 20,000 was marred by torrential rain and Frida slipped on the wet stage during the concert. However, all four members would later recall this concert to be the most memorable of their career. Upon their arrival in Melbourne, a civic reception was held at the Melbourne Town Hall and ABBA appeared on the balcony to greet an enthusiastic crowd of 6,000 people. In Melbourne, ABBA played three concerts at the Sidney Myer Music Bowl with 14,500 at each including the Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser and his family. At the first Melbourne concert, an additional 16,000 people gathered outside the fenced-off area to listen to the concert. In Adelaide, the group performed one concert at West Lakes Football Stadium before 20,000 people with another 10,000 listening outside. During the first of five concerts in Perth, there was a bomb scare with everyone having to evacuate the Entertainment Centre. The trip was accompanied by mass hysteria and unprecedented media attention ("Swedish ABBA stirs box-office in Down Under tour...and the media coverage of the quartet rivals that set to cover the upcoming Royal tour of Australia", wrote Variety), and is 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?"
In December 1977, ABBA followed up Arrival with the more ambitious fifth album The Album, released to coincide with the debut of ABBA: The Movie. Although the album was less well-received by UK reviewers, it did spawn more worldwide hits: "The Name of the Game" and "Take a Chance on Me", both topped the UK charts, and reached No. 12 and No. 3 respectively on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in the US. Although "Take a Chance on Me" did not top the American charts, it proved to be ABBA's biggest hit single in the United States, selling more copies than "Dancing Queen". The Album also included the ABBA signature tune, "Thank You for the Music", the B-side of "Eagle" in countries where the latter had been released as a single, and later released as an A-side single in the UK in 1983.
Polar Music Studio formation
By 1978, ABBA was one of the biggest bands in the world. They converted a vacant movie theatre into the Polar Music Studio, a state-of-the-art studio in Stockholm. The studio was used by several other bands; notably, Genesis' Duke and Led Zeppelin's In Through the Out Door were recorded there. During May, the group went to the US for a promotional campaign, performing on Olivia Newton-John's TV show. Recording sessions for "Summer Night City" were an uphill struggle, but upon release the song became another hit for the group. The track would set the stage for ABBA's foray into disco with their next album.On 9 January 1979, the group performed "Chiquitita" at the Music for UNICEF Concert held at the United Nations General Assembly to celebrate UNICEF's Year of the Child. ABBA donated the copyright of this worldwide hit to the UNICEF; see Music for UNICEF Concert. The single was released the following week, and reached No. 1 in ten countries.
North American and European tours
In mid-January 1979, Ulvaeus and Fältskog announced they were getting divorced. The news caused interest from the media, and led to speculation about the band's future. ABBA assured the press and their fan base they were continuing their work as a group, and that the divorce would not affect them. Nonetheless, the media continued to confront them with this in interviews. To escape the media swirl and concentrate on their writing, Benny and Björn secretly traveled to Compass Point Studios in Nassau, Bahamas, where for two weeks they prepared their next album's songs in relative quiet.The group's sixth album, Voulez-Vous, was released in April 1979, the title track of which was recorded at the famous Criteria Studios in Miami, U.S. with the assistance, among others, of recording engineer Tom Dowd. The album topped the charts across Europe and in Japan and Mexico, hit the Top 10 in Canada and Australia and the Top 20 in the US. None of the singles from the album reached No. 1 on the UK charts, but "Chiquitita", "Does Your Mother Know", "Angeleyes" and "Voulez-Vous" all charted no lower than No. 4. "I Have a Dream" was the exception, when the single reached No. 2 in UK and No. 1 on Eurochart Hot 100 singles. In Canada, "I Have a Dream" became ABBA's second No. 1 on the RPM Adult Contemporary chart, after "Fernando" hit the top previously. 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)", another number 3 hit in both, the UK and Germany. In Russia during the late 1970s, they were paid in oil commodities because of an embargo on the ruble.
On 13 September 1979, ABBA began their ABBA: The Tour at the Northlands Coliseum in Edmonton, Canada, with a full house of 14,000. "The voices of the band, Agnetha's high sauciness combined with round, rich lower tones of Anni-Frid, were excellent...Technically perfect, melodically correct and always in perfect pitch...The soft lower voice of Anni-Frid and the high, edgy vocals of Agnetha were stunning", raved Edmonton Journal. 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 canceled due to Agnetha Fältskog's emotional distress suffered during the flight from New York to Boston, when the private plane the group was on was subjected to extreme weather conditions and was unable to land for an extended period. They appeared on the Boston Music Hall stage for the performance ninety minutes late. The tour ended with a show in Toronto, Canada at Maple Leaf Gardens before a capacity crowd of 18,000. "Abba plays with surprising power and volume; but although they are loud, they're also clear, which does justice to the signature vocal sound...Anyone who's been waiting five years to see Abba will be well satisfied", wrote Record World.
On 19 October 1979, the tour resumed in Western Europe where the band played 23 sold-out gigs, including six sold-out nights at London's Wembley Arena.
Progression
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 same year saw the release of ABBA's seventh album Super Trouper, which reflected a certain change in ABBA's style with more prominent use of synthesizers and increasingly 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 No. 8 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and became ABBA's second Billboard Adult Contemporary No. 1. The song was allegedly written about Ulvaeus and Fältskog's marital tribulations. It was also re-recorded by Andersson and Ulvaeus with a slightly different backing track, by French chanteuse Mireille Mathieu at the end of 1980 – as "Bravo Tu As Gagne", with French lyrics by Alain Boublil. The next single from the album, "Super Trouper", also hit No. 1 in the UK as well as in Germany, becoming the group's ninth and final UK chart-topper. 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 No. 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 Latin America. "ABBA ORO" was released in 1999.
Final album and performances (1981–1982)
In January 1981, Ulvaeus married Lena Källersjö, and manager Stig Anderson celebrated his 50th birthday with a party. For this occasion, ABBA recorded the track 'Hovas Vittne' (a pun on the Swedish name for Jehovah's Witness and Anderson's birthplace, Hova) as a tribute to him, and released it only on 200 red vinyl copies, to be distributed to the guests attending the party. This single has become a sought-after collectible. In mid-February 1981, Andersson and Lyngstad announced they were filing for divorce. Information surfaced that their marriage had been an uphill struggle for years, and Benny had already met another woman, Mona Nörklit, whom he married in November 1981.Andersson and Ulvaeus had songwriting sessions during the first months of 1981, and recording sessions began in mid-March. At the end of April, the group recorded a TV special, Dick Cavett meets ABBA with the US talk show host Dick Cavett. The Visitors, ABBA's eighth and final studio album, showed a songwriting maturity and depth of feeling distinctly lacking from their earlier recordings but still placing 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, aging, and loss of innocence. This change of content led to the release of the album The Visitors including the UK No. 3 single "One of Us", proving the last of ABBA's nine number 1 singles in Germany in December 1981; and the swansong of their sixteen top 5 singles on the charts in South Africa.
Although it topped the album charts across most of Europe, including the UK and Germany, The Visitors was not as commercially successful as its predecessors, showing a commercial decline in previously loyal markets such as France, Australia or Japan. A track from The Visitors, "When All Is Said and Done", was released as a single in North America, Australia and New Zealand, and fittingly became ABBA's final Top 40 hit in the US (debuting on the U.S. charts on 31 December 1981), while also reaching the US Adult Contemporary Top 10 and No. 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 separating from a long-term partner, though it looked at the trauma more optimistically. With the now publicised story of Andersson and Lyngstad's divorce, speculation increased 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.
Last recording sessions
In the spring of 1982, songwriting sessions had started and the group came together for more recordings. Plans were not completely clear, but a new album was discussed and the prospect of a small tour suggested. The recording sessions in May and June were a struggle, and only three songs were eventually recorded: "You Owe Me One", "I Am the City", and "Just Like That". Andersson and Ulvaeus were not satisfied with the outcome, so the tapes were shelved and the group took a break for the summer.Back in the studio again 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 single releases to be named The Singles: The First Ten Years. New songwriting and recording sessions took place, and during October and November, 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. Neither single made the top 20 in the UK, though "The Day Before You Came" became a Top 5 hit in many European countries such as Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium. The album went to No. 1 in the UK and Belgium, Top 5 in the Netherlands and West Germany and Top 20 in many other countries. The last single, "Under Attack," hit the top 10 in about 3 European countries.
"I Am the City" and "Just Like That" were left unreleased on The Singles: The First Ten Years for possible inclusion on the next projected studio album from ABBA, though this never came to fruition. "I Am the City" was eventually released as a bonus track on the compilation album More ABBA Gold in 1993, while "Just Like That" has been recycled in new songs with other artists produced by Andersson and Ulvaeus. A reworked version of the verses ended up in the musical Chess. The chorus section of "Just Like That" was eventually released on a retrospective box set in 1994. Despite numerous requests from fans, Ulvaeus and Andersson are still refusing to release ABBA's version of "Just Like That" in its entirety, even though the complete version surfaced on bootlegs.
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 West Germany in the second week, to perform on 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.
Last performances
Andersson and Ulvaeus began collaborating with Tim Rice in early 1983 on writing songs for the musical project Chess, while Fältskog and Lyngstad both concentrated on international solo careers. While Andersson and Ulvaeus were working on the musical, a further cooperation between three of them came with the musical Abbacadabra that was produced in France for television. It was a children's musical utilising 14 ABBA songs. Alain and Daniel Boublil, who wrote Les Misérables, had been in touch with Stig Anderson about the project, and the TV musical was aired over Christmas on French TV and later a Dutch version was also broadcast. Boublil previously also wrote the French lyrics for Mirielle Mathieu's version of "The Winner Takes It All".Lyngstad, who had recently moved to Paris, participated in the French version, and recorded a single, "Belle", a duet with French singer Daniel Balavoine. The song was a cover of ABBA's instrumental 1976 track "Arrival". As the single "Belle" sold well in France, Cameron Mackintosh wanted to stage an English language version of the show in London, with the French lyrics translated by David Wood and Don Black; Andersson and Ulvaeus got involved in the project, and contributed with one new song, "The Seeker". "Abbacadabra" premièred 8 December 1983 at The Lyric Hammersmith Theatre in London, to mixed reviews and full houses for eight weeks, closing on 21 January 1984. Lyngstad was involved in this production as well, recording 'Belle' in English as "Time"; a duet with actor and singer B. A. Robertson: the single sold well, this time produced and recorded by Andersson and Ulvaeus.
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", which was 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 they 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" that later was to surface in Chess. The same year ABBA Live was released, featuring selections of live performances from the group's 1977 and 1979 tours. They were guests on the 50th birthday of Görel Hanser in 1999. Hanser was a long-time friend of all four, and also former secretary of Stig Anderson. Honouring Görel, ABBA performed a Swedish birthday song "Med En Enkel Tulipan" a cappella.
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 Sofie von Otter, and "When All Is Said And Done" with Swede Viktoria Tolstoy. Andersson and Ulvaeus both did an a cappella rendition of the first verse of "Fernando" as they accepted their Ivor Novello award in London in 2002. 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 singer Dan Daniell in 2003.
Breaking up
ABBA has never officially announced the end of the group, but the group has long been considered dissolved. Their last public performance together as ABBA was on the British TV programme The Late, Late Breakfast Show (live from Stockholm) 11 December 1982. In January 1983, Agnetha started recording sessions for a solo album, as Frida had successfully released her album Something's Going On some months earlier. Björn and Benny started songwriting sessions for the musical Chess, and ABBA was shelved in the meantime. In interviews, Björn and Benny denied the split of ABBA ("Who are we without our ladies? Initials of Brigitte Bardot?") and Frida and Agnetha kept claiming in interviews that ABBA would come together for a new album repeatedly during 1983 and 1984. Internal strife between the group and their manager escalated and the group sold their shares in Polar Music during 1983. With this, the foursome did not come together publicly until all four members were reunited at the Swedish premiere of Mamma Mia! on 4 July 2008.In an interview with the Sunday Telegraph, following the premiere, Björn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson confirmed that there was nothing that could entice them back on stage again. "We will never appear on stage again", Ulvaeus said. "There is simply no motivation to re-group. Money is not a factor and we would like people to remember us as we were. Young, exuberant, full of energy and ambition. I remember Robert Plant saying Led Zeppelin were a cover band now because they cover all their own stuff. I think that hit the nail on the head." However, on 3 January 2011, Agnetha, who has been long considered to be the most reclusive member of the group and possibly also the major obstacle to any reunion, raised the possibility of reuniting for a one-off engagement. She admitted that she has not yet brought the idea up to the other three members.
After ABBA
Andersson and Ulvaeus
In October 1984, Ulvaeus and Andersson together with lyricist Tim Rice released the musical concept double album Chess. The singles "One Night in Bangkok" (with vocals by Murray Head) and "I Know Him So Well" (a duet by Barbara Dickson and Elaine Paige and later also recorded by both Barbra Streisand and Whitney Houston) were both successes. In May 1986, the musical premièred 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 bad reviews. In Stockholm, the composers staged "Chess på svenska" ('Chess in Swedish') in 2003, with some new material including the musical numbers "Han är en man, han är ett barn" ("He's a man, he's a child") and "Glöm mig om du kan" ("Forget me if you can"). In 2008 the musical was again revived for a successful staging at London's Royal Albert Hall which subsequently was released on DVD, and then in two successful separate touring productions in the US and UK, in 2010.Andersson's and Ulvaeus' piece, Kristina från Duvemåla, an epic Swedish musical premiered in Malmö in southern Sweden in October 1995. The musical ran for five years in Stockholm, and an English version has been in development for some considerable time. It has been reported that a Broadway production is in its earliest stages of pre-production. In the meantime, following some earlier workshops, a full presentation of the English translation of the musical in concert, now with the shortened name of "Kristina", has taken place to capacity crowds in September 2009 at New York's Carnegie Hall, and in April 2010 at London's Royal Albert Hall followed by a CD release of the New York recordings.
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. In 1987, Andersson also released his first solo album on his own label, Mono Music, called "Klinga mina klockor" ("Ring my bells"), all new material inspired by Swedish folk music – and followed it with his 2nd album titled November 1989.
In the 1990s, Andersson wrote music for the popular Swedish cabaret quartet Ainbusk Singers, giving them two hits: "Lassie" and "Älska mig" ("Love me"), and later produced Shapes, an English-language album by the group's Josefin Nilsson with all-new material by Andersson and Ulvaeus. Andersson has also regularly written music for films (most notably to Roy Andersson's Songs from the Second Floor). In 2001, Andersson formed his own band, BAO, which released three successful albums in 2001, 2004 and 2007. Andersson has the distinction of remaining the longest in the Swedish Radio Svensktoppen charts; the song "Du är min man", "You Are My Man", sung by Helen Sjöholm, spent 278 weeks there between 2004 and 2009 . Andersson released his third album BAO 3 in October 2007 with new material with his band BAO and vocalists Helen Sjöholm and Tommy Körberg, as well as playing to full houses at two of Sweden's largest concert venues in October and November 2007 with an audience of 14,000.
Björn Ulvaeus 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, singing their 1966 hit "Marianne".
Andersson and Ulvaeus are highly involved in the worldwide productions of the musical Mamma Mia!, alongside Lyngstad who attends premieres. They were also involved in the production of the successful film version of the musical, which opened in July 2008. Andersson produced the soundtrack utilising many of the musicians ABBA used on their albums and tours. Andersson made a cameo appearance in the movie as a 'fisherman' piano player in the 'Dancing Queen' scene, while Ulvaeus is seen as a Greek god playing a lyre during the closing credits.
Andersson and Ulvaeus are continuously composing new material; most recently the two wrote the title track for Andersson's first international release, The Benny Andersson Band – The Story Of a Heart, released in July 2009. The album is a compilation of 14 tracks from Andersson's five Swedish-language releases, including five songs now recorded in English, and the new title song premiered on BBC2's Ken Bruce Show Monday on 25 May. A Swedish-language version, "Sommaren Du Fick" ('The Summer You Got'), was released in Sweden prior to the English version, with vocals by Helen Sjöholm. In the spring of 2009, Andersson also released a single recorded by the staff at his privately owned Stockholm hotel Hotel Rival, titled "2nd Best to None", accompanied by a video showing the staff at work. In 2008 the two wrote a song for Swedish singer Sissela Kyle titled "Jag vill bli gammal" ("I Wanna Grow Old"); for her Stockholm stage show "Your Days Are Numbered". Björn also contributed lyrics to ABBAs 1976 instrumental track Arrival for Sarah Brightman's cover version recorded for her 2008 'Winter Symphony album. New English lyrics have also been written for Bennys 1999 song 'Innan Gryningen' (also named 'Millennium Hymn'), new title "The Silence Of The Dawn" for Barbara Dickson. In 2007 they wrote the new songs "Han som har vunnit allt" ("He Who's Won It All") for actor/singer Anders Ekborg and "I Walk With You Mama" and "After the Rain" for opera singer Anne Sofie Von Otter for her Andersson tribute album "I Let The Music Speak".
Fältskog and Lyngstad
Both female members of ABBA pursued solo careers on the international scene after their work with ABBA. In 1982, Lyngstad chose Genesis drummer and singer Phil Collins to produce the album Something's Going On and unveiled the hit single and video "I Know There's Something Going On" in autumn of that year. The single became a No. 1 hit in France, where it spent five weeks at the top, Belgium, Switzerland and Costa Rica. The track reached No. 3 in Austria, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden and Poland, and was also a Top 10 hit in Germany, Italy, South Africa and Finland. In the United States, the single reached No. 13. In all, "I Know There's Something Going On" sold 3.5 million copies worldwide and is the biggest selling single any of the four members have had outside ABBA. Lyngstad's album sold 1.5 million copies internationally. Sveriges Television, documented this historical event, by filming the whole recording process. The result became a one-hour TV documentary, including interviews with Frida, Phil, Björn, and Benny as well as all the musicians. This documentary and the promotion videos from the album are included in Frida - The DVD.Frida's second solo album after ABBA was the experimental Shine, produced by Steve Lillywhite. "Shine" was recorded in Paris and released in 1984. "Shine" reached the Top 10 on the album charts in Sweden, Norway and Belgium and the Top 20 in the Netherlands. The leadsingle was the title track "Shine". This album was Frida's final studio album release for twelve years. It featured "Slowly", the last known Andersson-Ulvaeus composition to have been recorded by one of the former female ABBA vocalists. The promotion videos and clips for "Shine" are included in Frida - The DVD.
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 hit in Europe and Scandinavia, while the title track went to number 2 in South Africa. 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 the Netherlands and the Top 20 in Germany and France. Her album sold 1.2 million copies worldwide.
Fältskog's second post-ABBA solo album was Eyes of a Woman, released in March 1985, which reached No. 2 in Sweden and performed reasonably well in Europe. The first single from the album was her self-penned "I Won't Let You Go". In November 1987, Fältskog released her third post-ABBA solo album, the Peter Cetera-produced I Stand Alone, which also included the Billboard adult contemporary duet with Cetera, "I Wasn't the One (Who Said Goodbye)" as well as the European charting singles "The Last Time" and "Let It Shine". The album sold very well in Sweden, where it spent eight weeks at No. 1. Shortly after some minor European promotion for the album in early 1988, Fältskog withdrew from public life and halted her music career for a while. In 1996, she released her autobiography, 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 No. 1 in Sweden (achieving triple-platinum status), No. 6 in Germany, and No. 12 in the UK, winning a silver award, and achieving gold status in Finland. The single "If I Thought You'd Ever Change Your Mind" (a cover of the Cilla Black 60s song) became Fältskog's biggest solo hit in the UK, reaching the No. 11 position. The single achieved the No. 2 spot in Sweden and was a hit throughout Scandinavia and Europe. A further single "When You Walk in the Room" was released and peaked at no. 34 in the UK. In January 2007, she sang a live duet on stage with Swedish singer Tommy Körberg at the after party for the final showing of the musical, Mamma Mia!, in Stockholm, at which Benny Andersson and Björn Ulvaeus were also present.
In 1992 Frida was asked and chosen to be the chairperson for the environmental organisation "Artister för miljön" (Artists for the Environment) in Sweden. Frida accepted and became chairwoman for this organisation from 1992 to 1995. To mark her interests for the environment, she recorded the Julian Lennon song Saltwater and performed it live in Stockholm. She arranged and financed summer camps for poor children in Sweden, focusing on environmental and ecological issues. Her environmental work for this organisation led up to the decision to record again. Djupa andetag (Deep Breaths) was released towards the end of 1996 and became a success in Sweden, where it reached No. 1 and Scandinavia. The lyrics for the single from this album, "Även en blomma" (Even a Flower), deal with environmental issues. 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. The couple made several TV performances with this song in Germany. Lyngstad lives a low-profile life but occasionally appears at a party or charity function. On 26 August 1992, she married Prince Heinrich Ruzzo Reuss von Plauen, 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 Lise-Lotte in a car crash a year earlier.
On 15 November 2005, Anni-Frid Lyngstad's 60th birthday, Universal released the Frida Box Set, consisting of the solo albums she recorded for the Polar Label. Included is also the 3½ hour documentary Frida - The DVD. On this DVD, which covers Lyngstad's entire singing career, the viewer is guided by Frida herself through the years. From her TV debut in Sweden 1967 to the TV performances she made in Germany 2004, singing "The Sun Will Shine Again" together with Jon Lord of rock group Deep Purple. Many rare clips are included in the set and each performance is explained by Lyngstad herself. The interview with Lyngstad was filmed in the Swiss Alps in summer 2005.
Revival
The same year the members of ABBA went their separate ways, the French production of a 'tribute' show (a children's TV musical named Abbacadabra using 14 of ABBA's songs) spawned new interest in the group's music.After receiving little attention during the mid 1980s, ABBA's music experienced a resurgence in the early 1990s due to the UK synth-pop duo Erasure who released a cover EP featuring versions of ABBA's songs which topped the charts in early 1992. As U2 arrived in Stockholm for a concert in June, 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. September 1992 saw the release of ABBA Gold: Greatest Hits, a new compilation album. The single Dancing Queen received radio airplay in the UK in summer 1992 to promote the upcoming Gold album, as a result of which the song returned to the Top 20 of the UK singles chart in August that year, this time peaking at No. 16.
The enormous interest in the Gold compilation saw the release of More ABBA Gold: More ABBA Hits in 1993.
In 1994, two Australian cult films 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 group's hits and stand-out album tracks, was released with the involvement of all four members. "By the end of the twentieth century", American critic Chuck Klosterman wrote a decade later, "it was far more contrarian to hate ABBA than to love them."
ABBA were soon recognised and embraced by other acts: Evan Dando of The Lemonheads recorded a cover version of "Knowing Me, Knowing You", Sinéad O'Connor and Boyzone's Stephen Gately have recorded "Chiquitita", Tanita Tikaram, Blancmange and Steven Wilson paid tribute to "The Day Before You Came", Cliff Richard covered "Lay All Your Love On Me", while Dionne Warwick and Peter Cetera recorded their versions of "SOS". U.S. alternative-rock musician Marshall Crenshaw has also been known to play a version of "Knowing Me, Knowing You" in concert appearances, while legendary English Latin pop songwriter Richard Daniel Roman has recognized ABBA as a major influence. Swedish metal guitarist Yngwie Malmsteen covered "Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (A Man After Midnight)" with slightly altered lyrics.
Two different compilation albums of ABBA songs have been released. "ABBA: A Tribute" coincided with the 25th anniversary celebration and featured 17 songs, some of which were recorded especially for this release. Notable tracks include Go West's "One Of Us", Army Of Lovers "Hasta Manana", Information Society's "Lay All Your Love On Me", Erasure's "Take A Chance On Me" (with MC Kinky), and Frida's a cappella duet with The Real Group on "Dancing Queen". A second 12-track album was released in 1999, entitled "ABBAMANIA", with proceeds going to the Youth Music charity in England. It featured all new cover versions, notable tracks were by Madness ("Money, Money, Money"), Culture Club ("Voulez-Vous"), The Corrs ("The Winner Takes It All"), Steps ("Lay All Your Love On Me", "I Know Him So Well") and a medley entitled "Thank ABBA For The Music" performed by several artists and as featured on the Brits Awards that same year.
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 success, released on CD, and later toured Scandinavia and even went to Beijing in the People's Republic of China for two concerts.
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.
For the 2004 semi-final of the Eurovision Song Contest, staged in Istanbul thirty years after ABBA had won the contest in Brighton, all four members of ABBA appeared briefly in a special comedy video made for the interval act, entitled "Our Last Video Ever". Each of the four members of the group made a brief cameo role, as did others such as Cher and Rik Mayall and even Iron Maiden's Eddie. The video was not included in the official DVD release of the Eurovision Contest, but was issued as a separate DVD release, retitled "The Last Video" at the request of the former ABBA members.
In 2005, all four members of ABBA appeared at the Stockholm premiere of the musical Mamma Mia.
On 4 July 2008, all four ABBA members were reunited at the Swedish premiere of Mamma Mia!. It was only the second time all of them had appeared together in public since 1986. During the appearance, they re-emphasized that they intended never to officially reunite, citing the opinion of Robert Plant that the re-formed Led Zeppelin was more like a cover band of itself than the original band. Ulvaeus stated that he wanted the band to be remembered as they were during the peak years of their success. The compilation album ABBA Gold: Greatest Hits, originally released in 1992, returned to number one in the UK album charts for the fifth time on 3 August 2008. On 14 August 2008, the Mamma Mia! The Movie film soundtrack went to number 1 on the USA Billboard Charts. While ABBA were together, the highest album chart position they ever achieved in America was No. 14.
Most recently all eight studio albums, together with a ninth of rare tracks, have been released as ABBA The Albums. It hit several charts, peaking at No. 4 in Sweden and reaching the top 10 in several other European territories.
In 2008, Sony Computer Entertainment Europe, in collaboration with Universal Music Group Sweden AB, released SingStar ABBA on both PlayStation 2 and PlayStation 3 video game systems as part of the SingStar music video games. The game features 20 ABBA songs on PS2 and 25 on PS3, most of them No. 1 hits.
On 22 January 2009, Agnetha Fältskog and Anni-Frid Lyngstad showed up together to receive the Swedish music award "Rockbjörnen" (for "lifetime achievement") and gave an interview onstage; the two wanted to express gratitude for the honorary award and to thank their fans.
On 25 November 2009, PRS for Music announced that the British public voted ABBA as the band they would most like to reform.
ABBA was inducted into the Hit Parade Hall of Fame in 2010.
On 27 January 2010, ABBAWORLD, a 25-room touring exhibition featuring interactive and audiovisual activities debuted at Earl's Court Exhibition Centre in London, England. According to the exhibition's website, ABBAWORLD is "approved and fully supported" by the group.
The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
On 15 March 2010 ABBA was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame by Bee Gees members Barry Gibb and Robin Gibb. The ceremony was held at The Waldorf Astoria Hotel in New York City. The group was represented by Anni-Frid Lyngstad and Benny Andersson.
Success in the United States
During their active career, from 1972 to 1982, fourteen of ABBAs singles reached Top 40 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and on Cashbox Top 100 singles chart, ten of them reached Top 20 and four of them placed in Top 10 on both charts, with Dancing Queen peaking at No.1 also on both charts. While Fernando and SOS did not break Top 10 on Billboard Hot 100 chart they reached Top 10 on Cashbox ("Fernando) and Record World ('SOS") charts.The group also had twelve Top 20 singles on Billboard Adult Contemporary chart with two of them, Fernando and The Winner Takes It All, reaching No.1. Lay All Your Love On Me was ABBA's fourth No.1 single on Billboard charts topping its Hot Dance Club Play chart. Dancing Queen and Take A Chance On Me singles were certified gold (more than 1 million copies sold) by RIAA.
Nine ABBA albums made their way into the Top 100 on Billboard 200 album chart with seven of them getting into the Top 50. Four of those albums reached Top 20 with "ABBA The Album" at No.14 being the highest position. Five albums received RIAA gold (more than 500,000 copies sold) certification, and three acquired platinum (more than 1 million copies sold) status. ABBA Gold: Greatest Hits collection released in the US in 1993 became a 6-time platinum bestseller and topped Bilboard Top Pop Catalog Albums chart (it also reached No. 11 on a Billboard Comprehensive Albums chart).
Fashion, videos, advertising campaigns
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. 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 many different countries and personal appearances were not always possible. This was also done in an effort to minimize traveling, 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, realized the potential of showing a simple video clip on television to publicize 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.
In 1976, ABBA participated in a high-profile advertising campaign by the Matsushita Electric Industrial (today's Panasonic Corporation), which was designed to promote the brand "National". This campaign was designed initially for Australia, where "National" was still the primary brand used by Matsushita, who had not introduced the "Panasonic" brand to Australia yet despite its widespread use in other parts of the world such as the United States. However, the campaign was also aired in Japan. Five commercials, each approximately one minute long, were produced, each using the "National Song" sung by ABBA, which used the melody and instrumental arrangement of Fernando, adapted with new lyrics promoting National, and working in several slogans used by National in their advertising.
Political Controversy
In September 2010, band members Andersson and Ulvaeus criticized the far right Danish People's Party (DF) for using their hit Mamma Mia with modified lyrics at rallies. The band had threatened to sue the DF, saying they never allowed their music to be used politically and that they had absolutely no interest in supporting the party. Their record company Universal Music later said that no legal action would be taken because an agreement had been reached.
Discography
Bibliography
ABBA-related tributes
See also
Notes
;References
External links
Category:Atlantic Records artists Category:Eurodisco groups Category:Eurovision Song Contest entrants of 1974 Category:Eurovision Song Contest winners Category:Melodifestivalen contestants Category:Melodifestivalen winners Category:Multinational musical groups Category:Musical groups disestablished in 1983 Category:Musical groups established in 1972 Category:Musical quartets Category:RCA Records artists Category:Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees Category:Swedish dance music groups Category:Swedish Eurovision Song Contest entrants Category:Swedish musical groups Category:Swedish pop music groups Category:Schlager
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