ABBA
The Swedish pop group that became the third best-selling singles act in the history of the United Kingdom. Formed in Stockholm in September 1972 around two married couples — Agnetha Fältskog and Björn Ulvaeus, Anni-Frid Lyngstad and Benny Andersson — and built on the songwriting partnership of Andersson and Ulvaeus, the band won the Eurovision Song Contest for Sweden at The Dome in Brighton on April 6, 1974, with Waterloo, and spent the eight years that followed releasing the records that defined late-twentieth-century European pop. Arrival, ABBA: The Album, Voulez-Vous, Super Trouper, and The Visitors produced Dancing Queen, Knowing Me, Knowing You, Take a Chance on Me, The Winner Takes It All, and Fernando, among twenty other singles that charted across the world.
The two marriages dissolved over the course of the band's working life and the lyrics darkened across the final three records. ABBA disbanded in December 1982. They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2010, the first non-Anglophone act ever to be so honoured. They have sold an estimated one hundred and fifty million records worldwide. Their compilation ABBA Gold has been certified Platinum a hundred and twenty-eight times across twenty-eight countries and has been in the UK album chart for more than 1,200 weeks. The four members reunited in 2016 to record Voyage, released in November 2021 — their first studio album in forty years — and opened the ABBA Voyage virtual-avatar concert residency at the purpose-built ABBA Arena in London in May 2022. The residency continues.
Articles on ABBA
ABBA – Thank You For The Music
Benny Andersson Composed the Melody at a Dinner Party — Playing a Small Piano Under the Stairs. The First Recording Was So Steeped in Doris Day That the Band Called It That. The Second Take Became One of the Most Loved Songs ABBA Ever Made.
ABBA – SOS
They Chose a Different Song as the Lead Single — and Released the One That Defined Them Months Later
ABBA – The Winner Takes It All
Björn Ulvaeus Sang the Demo in Nonsense French — and Then Had to Ask His Newly Divorced Wife to Sing It for Real
ABBA – Ring Ring
The Band That Didn't Have a Name Yet — and the Song That Made Them Figure One Out
ABBA – Knowing Me, Knowing You
When Number One Number One Became A Prophecy
ABBA – Happy New Year
John Cleese Said No To Their Musical, So They Wrote It Anyway
ABBA – The Day Before You Came
ABBA – Fernando
The Song Began Life With the Working Title "Tango," Named After a Stockholm Bartender, Written for the Brunette Half of ABBA to Sing in Swedish on Her Solo Album. The English Rewrite Sold Ten Million Copies and Held the Australian #1 Record for Forty Years.
ABBA – Waterloo
ABBA – Money, Money, Money
ABBA – Voulez-Vous
When Miami Disco Met Swedish Perfection
ABBA – Dancing Queen
ABBA knew they had a masterpiece the moment they built it — a rare certainty for a band that admitted you can almost never tell — and they unveiled it at a royal gala the night before a king married his queen.