Mikory's ABBA-blog

ABBA keep cool, but someimes they disagree

      - Sometimes it's undestand what is going on around us. Anni-Frid Lyngstad, once a former dance band singer from Eskilstuna, now known as "Frida" in the Swedish Music Industry ABBA, admits that sometimes the nerves gets the better of her. What I hate most i the long travelling. You have to look you best even though your body is aching from pain and jetlag.
     Even the boys in the band agree.
     - It's the worst for the girls, we don't hav to think about "fixing our face" care about what hair look like and being fashionmodels in private.
     On the "outside" ABBA's profile is the well brought up singing/songgroup that (almost) everyone can like. Två married couples (well Anni-Frid and Benny  are just living together and has done so for years.) Without any innerconflicts or controversys.

     But believe it or not - the ABBA people are just normal. With little aches and pains, bad moods, freqvent irritation at each other,all that stuff that makes it hard to smile pretty for the camera and looking cool.

     * Frida often comes three or four minutes late to an appoinment at the hotelllobby. Agnetha, who is *always* on time gets mad at Frida.

     * Agnetha must keepe a  tab on her bloodpresure  check she was expected her daughter Linda (born 23 February 1973) the doctors discovered that her bloodpressure is way too low.

     * Benny and Frida are night people, while Agnetha and Björn are early risers.

     * In the redordingstudio the tempers may fly amongst the walls, at least 3/4 of the group. Benny seem to be the one who clams everyone down.

     * To avoid our fans getting the wrong pictures of we always say no, and if we did let reporters and fans into the studio we we couldn'nt be honest in our musicmaking.

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.

Fantastic ABBA !!! Here are the pictures from their incredible success in Australia. Now they are back in Sweden again.

Now they are finally back home. After two intsense weeks in Australia ABBA returned to Sweden, to their own homes, their own beds, ordinary Swedish cooking and the much sought after privacy at their Lidingö villas.
     On these two pages you see the proof of their success, if proof would be necessary, Because ABBA hit Australia like a typhoon. The prices for the tickets skyrocketed to up to five times the originl fee on the black market, The teenagers were screaming and the older women in the audenice cheered of course.ABBA The Phenomenon made bigger headlines than a kangaroo having given birth to 25 baies. In other words, everythings was just as exptected. The European leg of the tour was a little easier. ABBA didn't have to stay in their hotel rooms for almost 24 hours a day. However, one day they made trip by boat to Port Philip Bay outside of Phillipe Bay outside of Melbourne. It resulted in that instead of having writing autographs for teenagers, they had to write autopgraphs to the fishermen, who for the day couldn't care about fishing at all as long as ABBA were close by.
     Right now the group are resting and recharching their batteries at home. Benny and Frida had planned to take a two weeks vacation arbroad, but they changed their mind.
      The next stop on thir world promotional tour will be USA. After that they group will enjoy a goood old archipelago holiday on their own private island, called Viggsö, But there will be not rest for the group, at the same time they are expected to write new material. A new album is planned  for Christmas.
     ABBA's enormous popularity shows no sign of slowing down in Australia. But there are always nasty journalists who just wrie stories based on no reailty check at all. The Englishman Anthony Thorncrofft is claiming that ABBA are as entertaing as the Black Death. Apart from the fact "that Agnetha and Frida are shaking their behinds like Swedish au-pairgirls." But I guess that's his opinion!

ABBA 1976: TV Week January 3rd

Tour is the word for €˜'record'success in Australia

Last week we covered the Australian acts who made the Australian charts in 1975. So this week we are going to have a look at the international groups who dominated our charts throughout the same period.

Probably the group to make the biggest impression on the Australian charts for 1975 was the Swedish group ABBA. Not since The Beatles has a group achieved three singles at the one time on our charts, but ABBA did it with "Mamma Mia", "I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do", and most recently with "S.O.S".

Not only that, it looks as if "Mamma Mia" could be the biggest selling single for 1975.

The odd thing about this group is that image wise we only know four members, the piano player, the bass player and the two female singers, but in fact when recording in Sweden the group use a lot of Swedish musicians to record their backing tracks. Session men or not, this certainly hasn'€™t stopped ABBA from becoming one of the top world sellers of today, and I would imagine that in 1976 we will still see this group dominate the charts.And don'€™t forget that there is a proposed ABBA Australian tour late this year.

ABBA 1976: TV Week 3 April

ABBA gets it on! 

Swedish pop group ABBA created a sensation with their clothes as well as their singing during their recent Australian visit.

Björn Ulvaeus, Agnetha Fältskog (Anna), Anni-Frid Lyngstad (Frida) and Benny Andersson, who make up ABBA, brought with them over $30,000 worth of tailored outfits.

They had the clothes, pictured here, especially made for the Bandstand special they recorded during their nine-day visit to Sydney and Melbourne.

As well as recording in the TCN9 studios, the group also visited renowned Sydney beauty spots and filmed segments to be made into a show for international release.

Overseas countries will see ABBA cruising up the Hawkesbury River, taking a trip on Sydney Harbour, and visiting the koala sanctuary at Bobbin Head.

While ABBA were in Australia they also appeared on The Don Lane Show and Celebrity Squares.

The group will return to Australia in November for a concert tour.

ABBA 1975: TV-Week 15 Nov 1975

Samuel Inglles has provided me with lots of great old articles from Australia. I will publish them here, so keep coming back. Here's the first one:

TV Week – 15 November 1975 (Page 27) 

Meldrum’s Humdrum

ABBA - Australian success. By Ian Meldrum

Without a doubt the most successful group to make it on the Australian national charts this year just has to be the Swedish group ABBA because over the past three months they have come out of nowhere with a single titled "I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do".

It shot into No.1 and then they had the audacity to release another almost at the same time titled "Mamma Mia" and shoot it to No.1 replacing "I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do".

In fact on the top Melbourne charts 3XY, they are holding the No.1 and 2 positions. And what’s even more astonishing, the recording company RCA Records announced this week that they have released ABBA’s English and American hit "S.O.S." for the Christmas period…which could very well mean that within four weeks we could see ABBA on the national top ten with three hits.

Photo: Here’s ABBA, the great Swedish group we’re hearing so much of.