Mikory's ABBA-blog

1974 ABBA schmoozing with the US consul

Former ABBA stars reach settlement over script of "Kristina från Duvemåla"

     — Former ABBA stars Björn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson said Monday they have reached a settlement with a Swedish playwright in a copyright dispute over one of their musicals.
     In a joint statement, the two musicians and Carl-Johan Seth said they had requested the case be recalled from an appeals court that was supposed to hear it this week.

Both sides had been feuding over who wrote the script for the musical "Kristina from Duvemåla", which has been seen by more than one million people in Sweden.

Seth appealed a lower court ruling last year in favour of Andersson and Ulvaeus, who rejected Seth's claims that he was the main writer of the script.

However, both sides agreed to drop the case after reaching a settlement that made it possible to "move on as friends," Monday's statement said. It did not give other details.

Seth's lawyer, Staffan Michelson, said his client's reputation as a playwright has been "completely restored" and that the scheduled court hearing this Wednesday had been cancelled.

The musical is based on novels by Swedish writer Wilhelm Moberg, which depict the journey by Swedish emigrants to the U.S. in 1850.

ABBA, which also included singers Agnetha Faltskog and Anni-Frid Lyngstad, gained worldwide fame in the 1970s and early 1980s.

ABBA - The Museum

Swedish west coast newspaper Bohuslänningen reports on the museum:

"The world's first ABBA-museum!
     The four members of ABBA have finally agreed to an ABBA-museum. For years the loyal ABBA-fans have missed a place to go to where they can find out more about ABBA and look at memorabilia. Unlike Elvis Presley's "Graceland" there has never been a meeting place for the group's devoted fans. But now the husband-and-wife-team Ewa Wigenheim-Westman and Ulf Westman have persuaded Björn, Benny, Agnetha and Anni-Frid to lend out and donate objects from their career to a museum. "ABBA - The Museum" will be located at Stora Tullhuset in Stockholm. It will open on 3 June, 2009."

ABBA After Brighton: Now they make five times more

MÜNICH (Aftonbladet ) By Nils Lodin. December 29, 1974

It was on April 6 when Sweden got four European Masters in singing and playing a schlager. Four  Swedish young from Vallentuna, outside of Stockholm became worldfamous in all of Europe. ABBA and "Waterloo" won the Eurovision Song Contest in Brighton. It was the beginning of what you could call an international career.
     But it's fair to say that ABBA had a little head start on the continent about a year earlier. I'm one who can't deny it. My job as a freelance foreign correspondent involved alot of driving. And last summer i couln't turn on the car radio, no matter if I was in Switzerland, West Germany, Austria - without having "Ring Ring" seriously damaging my ears,

INTERNATIONAL WORLDSTARS
     But down on the continent ABBA were already success by last year - but not under the group name ABBA, no they went by their real names; Anna und Frida und Benny und Bjorn, was what they were called here.

     But with the Eurovision  Song Contest victory under their belt they became really famous. Their music ended up on the charts in both Europe and the United States. They sold lots of records and they travelled around showcasing themselves and their music.

     I met up with them in Münich, four really likeable young people who  didn't act like superstars.

BENNY LIKES HIS FOOD
     There was Benny Andersson, the organist who really enjoy the classic music and second to that is his love for food. He wanted to know everything about the restaurants in Münich.
     - Eating is the only fun you have when you are out on a tour like this. You rush from hotel to hotel, from arena to areana. And in the end the only lasting memory of a trip like this is what you ate.

     There was Benny's fiancée Anni-Frid, the member of the group who cares about the group's appearance on stage. Stageclothes should be wacky and happy and fun

DEMANDING DANCE ROUTINES.
     She and Agnetha exercised on a tight schedule before the European Tour "if we hadn't we couldn't have coped with allt the movement and dancing on stage.

     The blonde, Agnetha took it a little easier on stage. Her movements were more reserved, most of the time she just wiggled her now famous butt.

     If I'm honest - and I know I should be - the girls' danceroutines were a little too ambitious, it made it look strained. It strained both Agnetha and Anni-Frid - and the audience.

     Björn, Agnetha's better half, is the one who has written the lyrics - in English - to the groups' songs, and they were all original songs that never had a Swedish lyrics before.

     - Björn is really good at that, Agnetha explained. And his English is so good he can read books that are written in English with no  problem whatsoever.

THE LYRICS ARE IMPORTANT
     I discretely asked if the lyrics really mattered, if a concert going audience really listens to the lyrics.
     - It is important, says Björn. If you listen to a song many times the lyrics get noticed too. It is more important to the recordbuyer, not as important for the concertgoing audience.
     To tell the truth ABBA and their Big Daddy Stikkan Anderson, were prepared that this tour wouldn't make any more - quite the opposite.
     We saw it more like a publicity tour says Hansi Schwarz, the tourleader and a friend of Björn's since his Hootenanny Singers days. If the tour doesn't make a profit - the record sell will make up for it.
     And what about the future - are ABBA only going to sing easy accessible songs like "Honey, Honey" and cater to the wider record buying audiences
     - Never, says Björn and Benny. The money isn't the most important thing to us. We want to play the music we like.
     But ABBA's songs have generated a lot of money this year [1974]. The members of the group are making more than five times of what they used to after their victory in Brighton.
     ABBA have had their best year so far - and the success seems to keep coming. Right now is their new single "So Long" selling very well, especially in West Germany.

My aunt ruined my life 33 years ago today...

...or at least it felt so when she decided to celebrate her 60th birthday in Stockholm instead of Karlskrona where she lived. My cousin, 13 at the time, and I, 11, had been talking for months about the ABBA concert at Stockholms Konserthus on January 11, 1975. Then my aunt (God bless her soul she is no longer with us) dropped this bomb on us.
     We were sulking the whole evening and it really felt like the end of the world.
     I got to see the show later that year during the Folkpark tour. I attended the concert in Kristianopel on July 5, 1975. A very balmy evening, the summer of 1975 was the hottest, sunniest summer in years.

Merry Christmas and a Happy 2008

Dear readers,
Thank you for all your mails, criticism, cheers friendship I have received this year. I'm proud to tell you that this blog now has reached 300.000 hits since the start in 2005. We certainly aren't a very little group of ABBA fans. The interest is higher than ever before. I'm sure Agnetha, Björn, Benny, and Frida are all really proud that people still care so much for their music.
     To get you into the Christmas mood here are four songs from Agnetha and Frida that have connections to the holiday.    

     Thank you for this year and let's all hope for an even better 2008!Love, Mikael
     SONG 1 SONG 2 SONG 3 SONG 4

Hänt i Veckan 4 April 1974 >Vote For ABBA<

In issue 14 of Swedish weekly magazine "Hänt I Veckan" of 1974., there's a list of all the 18  songs for the Eurovision Song Contest in Brighton. The headlines say "The experts believe in a fair place for ABBA's "Waterloo".

TV1 Saturday at 9.30 pm
Tonight is the night of the Eurovision Song Contest 1974. In one corner is ABBA and in the other 17 more or less good sounding representatives from different countries....

ABBA idols of 1975

The most popular idols of 1975 in Sweden. From Allers magazine. 

These fantastic photos will sell ABBA to the Soviet Union and Japan

From Hänt I Veckan issue 37, 1978. Now you will be able to see ABBA on TV - twice!

The most requested TV-show in Sweden is ABBA in their own show. And now it's becoming a reality. The pressure from the Swedish viewers has been very strong, ABBA are the last to deny it. It hasn't been a matter of the group asking for too much money, though, but only lack of time.
     But now, Hänt can reveal the plans for a new co-production between Swedish TV1 and British BBC. A 30-minute TV-special will be aired before Christmas.
     ABBA-fans don't have to wait that long though to see their idols. In November TV1 will air the talked about show ABBA recorded with Olivia Newton-John and John Travolta, The show was aired in the US in May of this year as a start of the campaign of promoting ABBA as "The Swedish Super Group ABBA", which resulted in a huge success: two platinum awards for the albums ABBA Greatest Hits and ABBA - The Album, both sold over 1 million records.
     So now when America has been conqured Stikkan sets his eyes on Japan.
     - Things have started to take off there, he tells us at Hänt I Veckan. In June of this year no less than three ABBA-shows were shown on Japanese TV, among them the Olivia Newton-John show and now we have been invited to Japan to record an hour long show.
     In the middle of November the group will travel to Tokyo, with some quick stops in the US for guest appearances on American shows.
     In Tokyo the Swedish embassy will host a reception for 250 journalists, radio- and TV-people.
     There will not be any concert tours this year. Maybe next year, 1979.
     - We have plenty of offers and it would be impossible to do them all, says Stikkan. We have also received an offer of a Far Eastern tour that we are considering. It would include Bangkok, Hongkong, Singapore, Manila, Tokyo and Osaka. If it happens we would like to end the concert tour in Moscow.
     At the moment ABBA are working hard in their own studio. A new single "Summer Night City" has already been released and the new album is expected to be available in the shops before Christmas.
     The summer of 1978 has been a special time for ABBA. For the first summer in many years they have treated themselves to a proper holiday. Ever since 1974, with their big break with "Waterloo" every summer has been spent travelling around making TV-appearences  abroad and most of all they have worked, writing new material for upcoming albums. In the dark recording studio ABBA hardly notices that there's summer outside. They spend up till 12 hours a day in the studio. Several times Björn has joked with Hänt I Veckan saying that he should have become a teacher instead so he would have been able to have eight weeks free every summer. That would have meant I could have been out sailing now.
     This summer it was decided to plan the work so a long summer holiday would be possible. Since ABBA now have their own recording studio they don't have to wait their turn when they want to record something.
     The summer has mostly been spend on the groups island in the Stockholm archipelago. Benny and Frida started their holidays with a couple of weeks in the West Indies. Agnetha and Björn has spent that time together with their children on the island.
      When the weather has allowed them, they have been out sailing. Björn Ulvaeus is born and raised in Västervi and has always been keen on sailing.
     Benny and Frida live their lives a little more intense and quick, In the middle of July they bought their high speed motor boat for a couple of millions. With their new boat Frida and Benny have travelled around the West coast of Sweden, from the Stockolm archipelago down to Båstad and the West cost.
     Every now and then the two couples have met up at their island in the Stockholm archipelago, where Björn and Benny has made good use of the time and spent some time writing new material together. The result of these summer work we will all be able to hear, before Christmas.

Just one comment from me - Björn what were you thinking when you wore thos red short-shorts...?  :D

ABBA on cover of Dutch magazine

In an article in a Dutch magazine called HP De Tijd from 28 September 2007 the following article accompanied the (very nice - click to enlarge) ABBA photo on the cover:

ABBA
Swedish hitmachine with vocals from Anni-Frid (the dark one) and Agnetha (the blonde one) and compositions from their somewhat incompatible looking men Benny (the one with the beard) and Björn (the other one).
     Back then their music was regarded by experts as commercial trash pop music for infants, but nowadays Benny and Björn are seen as the Lennon & McCartney of the Seventies.
     An ABBA reunion could be the most profitable of all times, but according to insiders that's just as likely as the comeback of John Denver.

Thanks to my good friend in the Netherlands for providing the scans and the translation.