Witnessing The Arrival Of Abba

From the beautiful, burning beaches of the West coast of California to the smallest, poorest lowliest communities of Japan, Abba will always be the worlds biggest, highest paid international group of the 20th of century and beyond. This Swedish quartet of individual songsters on their own right joined forces originally in 1971. The powerful drive of creative writing came from the two male members, Benny Andersson and Bjorn Ulvaeus. The two iconic female voices came from Agnetha Faltskog and Anni-Frid (Frida) Lyngstad. Together, their real success came with their Eurovision winning song, ‘Waterloo’ in 1974. It was to be the biggest winning euro song ever. No winning artist has topped it since. On the back of this event, it was the springboard that was enough to launch them into a stunning, media stricken career peppered with wonderful highs and rock bottom lows. It was these terrifying times that forcibly led to their spilt in 1982. Ironically, it was their enormous success and mountainous financial awards that was to be their ruin. Agnetha, the beautiful, shy, golden haired girl who paid the highest price of the fame of Abba. Once finding the comfort in total solitude and isolation in departing her life from the rest of the world, she stayed, not daring to venture out from her remote farm in Sweden. Even giving up speaking English, she lives still, in her own world of closed walls and unanswered telephones.

Forever idolised by the rest of the world, Benny and Bjorn have allowed their fame to work for themselves. Co writing with Tim Rice on the theatrical music score in ‘Chess’, they have also appeared in the 1993 tour of U2 and go on to write and produce the loosely based biography of Abba titled, ’Mamma Mia.’ This show continues to play to a sell out house in the West End.

By the time ’Arrival’ was released in the Britain in November 1976, it was already their forth U.K release. It went straight to number one and stayed for a proud 92 weeks. Benny and Frida had been a long term couple and eventually married in 1978. Bjorn and Agnetha were already married in 1973. They divorced in 1979 and Benny and Frida divorced in 1981. Similar to Fleetwood Mac, they had had their fill of personal relationship heartaches. Probably more so than Mac, their troubles of the heart had been widely covered and persisted by the media, especially over here. Being aware of their enormous fame, they remained assured, erect and professional at all times both in front of the press and on stage and like Mac again, their sorrowfulness outside the public eye only fuelled their writing capabilities. Their sad songs became more pronounced and soulful. The downside of this was that sad songs were subjected to analysis. Were they telling us their own feelings of their own break ups? Were they having affairs? It didn’t matter. Bringing a tear to the eye of their listeners, they touched on our own heart felt tragedies and this only enforced their role as the greatest international group. They were human, and this as we know, sells, especially records. Abba, a acronym of their first initials, sold over a hundred million records worldwide and continue to do so.

‘Arrival’ was a perfect piece of hits singles, (and not too many) and thought provoking newer songs adding to the delight of the listener. They already had produced a ’Greatest Hits’ album in April of 1976, so to throw more singles at the audience that they had thrown before would have been a mistake. As we discovered from Abba at the time of this album’s release, Benny and Bjorn were professional executives of their craft from the word go. No album was ever going to be sloppy. No single was ever going to be mediocre. Their performance was always polished to a very euro manner, but they had experienced their fair share of flops. Their first UK album, ’Waterloo’ only made number 28 in August 1974. In June 1975, ’Abba’ only reached number 13, so for the arrival of ’Arrival’ it was essential that this album was to do well, before the band was to be labelled a ’bit of a joke.’

We take a look at the front cover and see the members sitting in a clear, see through helicopter shot, presumably at the end of the day with a glorious sunset behind the cameraman ( Ola Lager). The golden light of the setting sun gently lays across their faces giving a softness to the picture. Inspired by Rune Soderquist, this pose gives an indication to the music content within. There is, to be honest, a softness to the quality. We hear a Celtic style piece of instramentalisation in the form of the final track, the title, ‘Arrival.’ The album is peaceful in many places, pleasant to the ear and sometimes engaging in its form. We are open to the creativity of this band. Although intrusting us with the hit singles, they are aware that we will give the same interest to the unknown tracks as well as the well known.

Our first track is ‘When I Kissed The Teacher.’ At three minutes long, it is the standard single length. The solo lead is Agnetha. A dreamy acoustic takes us into the intro, before it opens up into a quick beated, euro single. It is full of all the right timings, complicated backing vocals and tinkleling bells and keyboards. There are two featured drummer used on this album. Ola Brunket plays on eight of the track and Roger Palm on only one. Abba’s unique brand of inoffensive pop entertains and delights audiences of all ages. Foot tapping, head nodding and cheerful lyrics (most of the time), this albums starts with a pretty song . The guitar on this particular track could have been borrowed from Led Zep. With a Mamma Mia style underlying in the background, it is creaming theatrical musical theme. We can imagine this is to be in some stage show. It is a good track and there’s a lot of little touches to be found it. Over all, we can se why this wasn’t release as a single, it doesn’t have that punch that Benny and Bjorn would have insisted on.

‘Dancing Queen’ was a different kettle of fish. (where does that saying come from?) This did have that punch. This track probably doesn’t need any describing and I defy anyone out there who doesn’t know this. it’s the theme of all seventies, teenage parties. A coming of age (and gay anthem nowadays) track, it was unique and touched with piano, strings and shuffling percussions by Malando Gassama. Tambourines rattle gently within this swaying, either love it or loathe it track. On the 21st of August, 1976, we went mad over it. Then not so mad over it with its reissue in 1992, when it only reached number 16. Now get out of those platforms, spangle head band and twirl to your hearts content. Unfortunately, for those of us who remember it the first time around, we’d say it was the most over done, overplayed record of all time. We have heard too much, better pass it onto the next generation.

‘My Love, My Life,’ is a true soulful song, but perhaps not the real gut wrenched that we were subjected to the future years of the band. Lest face it, its not too suicidal, when this album was recorded, they were all still happily together. It is the fore runner of ‘Thank you For The Music,’ and with the accompaniment of the doubled backing vocals creating the sense of a hundred choir voices gives the track an essence that was truly Abba. It is the perfect come down from the ceiling after the energy of ‘Dancing Queen.’ Just the opening keyboard is enough to bring a lump to the throat. Our faces are sullen, as we are led through the proverbial church entrance. It is an angelic piece of sombre meaningful lyrics. Agnetha , with those doe eyes looking as though they are about to cry, brings this piece to its knees, or the listener, one or the other. Let us pray at the sound of those church chime bars. Again, no punch, or wrist slashing qualities for this to be a single. We introduce Janne Schaffer in electric guitar ( I’ll let try you and pick this out on the track, because I couldn’t!)

‘Dum Dum Diddle,’ should be explanatory. It a jolly track but reminds me of a Bay City Rollers B side. It is a seventies party song., or possibly a middle aged, sobering New Years Eve record. I can see the flowing skirts, socks pulled up to the knee and sandals…hang on… that was me… Too much jelly and ice cream, my son, of five years old, would love this track. The Tweenies have nothing on this Abba track. At least they will pick up the lyrics quicker that we could… Nice touch of rolling up and down the synthesisers towards the end to give a little edge. Lasse Wellander features on acoustic guitar here and on the next track.

One of my favourites now appears on this album as track number five. ‘Knowing Me, Knowing You.’ has been made famous, not just by Abba, but by Steve Coogan as the inexcusable Alan Partridge. A strong acoustic, great vocals from both Frida and Agnetha. One thing to be noted here is the versatility of these two female vocals as they entwine with each other so they almost sound the same voice. Sing along able, it uses that iconic guitar riff that has become the epitome of the track. A good single choice, it made number one quickly after its release in February 1977. Another wise move by the band, was to spread out the releases from the album over a steady length of time and not all on top of each other. They had learnt how to govern and manage themselves, that they had practically become an institution. Nothing got passed Benny and Bjorn. They were the masters of this project and everything was going to have a strategy from beginning to end. They were destined to be respected and admired, and I think for the band, they would never have accepted anything less. A powerful vocal track allowing the female voices (Frida takes the lead here) to cry the lyrics out with all they have. Ah ha!

The sixth track is the very popular, ‘Money, Money, Money.’ A tongue in cheek theatrical song about a woman wanting to find a sugar daddy. It is not really a pop record, or even a disco track. It’s quite literally a song to listen to, appreciate but be amused by it. Very much on the same par as Liza Minnelli and Joel Gray’s loot seeking ditty from the 1972 film, Cabaret titled ‘Money Makes The World Go Round.’ A song for fun I guess one could say about his track. With its crafty, sinister chords and Frida’s deep, scheming vocals, we can imagine her cowered over the microphone stand meagrely rubbing her hands. It was Abba’s tribute to Fagin from Oliver Twist. Haven’t we all had a day dream about this song? At least the lyrics have certainly passed through our minds at one stage or another….
Released on the 20th of November 1976, it reached a fairly impressive number three. We obviously couldn’t get enough of this intriguing record as we allowed it to stay in the charts for 13 weeks. Abba certainly did get their money money money. It was the pressures of the fame that came with it that they wanted to get away from.

‘That’s Me,’ is more of the throw back to their euro stardom. It quite happily declares its euro ism. Complete with disco beat, lots of maracas shaking and meaningless lyrics, it is all glitter and no sparkle. Someone is having a great time running their hands in a sporadic fashion up and down the keyboard, that the effect is quite awful, but let’s not forget, this is the era of sonic seventies, tasteless disco. With all this glammed up trash, we could only await for the next Earth Wind And Fire record to calm our nerves… The opening funky ‘Doobie Brothers’ style of piano and groovy beats sounds promising, but after too much atomic laser synthesiser sounds lighting up the background like machine gun fire works, it starts to lose the very little appeal it had in the first place. Never mind. Thank Goodness they didn’t go into Eurovision with this track instead. We would all be sitting around now saying… ‘Abba…who?’

‘Why Did It Have To Be Me,’ is a glimmering shadow of the earlier hit for Abba, ‘I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do,’ With its strolling rock and roll theme, its a little doowop and too much razzamatazz. Move over Chas n Dave, it would seem that from some brief moment, they might have had competition… Sung as lead by Bjorn, (something that wasn’t heard often was the men singing lead) he actually has a kind, soft voice. Perhaps Abba should have let the men step forward more often. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed the voices of Agnetha and Frida, but to hear tracks like this one, no matter how bad it was, was a refreshing change.

‘Tiger’ is a fairly short track in length. At only two minutes, 53 seconds, its about a flat as ‘That’s Me.’ It is difficult to review something now that thirty years ago was new, exciting and like nothing heard before. One needs to put oneself back in time to review an album such as this well. ‘Tiger’ is a repetition of the same chord throughout. The lyrics are pretty dire, ‘I am behind you, I’ll always find you, I am the Tiger.’ What the listener will find the utmost shocking is the awful, subhuman ending here the females are subjected to hitting the highest note that they honestly sound as though they are being strangled by their own tiger. Probably more at home in the musical, The Lion King rather than a pop album, but this was Abba, and being from a country like Sweden, their music was often in different stage styles and sometimes more naive than British music or American. The rest of Europe were so backward in their song writing, especially during the seventies, literally brought over to us child like songs. It was as if they didn’t know how to write anything gritty. I mentioned The Tweenies, well, I can imagine them covering this track on their next Cbeebies tour…….if not then The Wiggles certainly will……

The best, it can be said, is perhaps left until last on this album. The title track was so atmospheric that even Mike Oldfield couldn’t wait to get his hands on this. ‘Arrival,’ is an instrumental piece of a strong Celtic theme. Abba were in their own class when it came to producing atmospherics within songs. This became more apparent in later work when their ability to incorporate synthesisers upon synthesisers gave their songs such a fullness that it like having Phil Spector round to fiddle with your graphic equalizer. The only trouble was, that Abba tours were so limited due to the difficulties enacting their tracks live. If this is the listener’s first taste of ‘Arrival’ the track, then I suggest ‘Eagle’ from Greatest Hits, Vol II. A purely scenic and transforming song that will have you gliding on the wings of a giant bird of prey scouring the Scottish mountains. ‘Arrival,’ was certainly the fore runner of this. ‘Eagle’ didn’t appear until the release of ‘The Album’ in January 1978.

Abba now live amongst our dusty record collections and sometimes get an airing at a drunken party, long gone has the glam rock glitter boots, the sparkly lip gloss and the long beards (never suited the girls) Lost are the 16 UK albums, nine of them, number ones, only ‘Gold’ remains with us, well over three hundred and forty three weeks in the album chart and still counting…

John Peel loved them and so did we. They offered us a chance to see that the world wasn’t really flat and actually there are other countries out there. Closeted in our little Britain world, we couldn’t imagine anything over the sea, until Abba. Perhaps now all we have left apart from those old records, is the awful tribute bands and terrible take offs as if we are supposed to be impressed with ‘Bjorn Again,’ and bands lower down the talent scale.

If we really need to hear Abba again, let be the original……and let it be ‘Arrival’….



Or my next review will be on The Wiggles……




pictures from wikipedia.


©M. Duffy (sam1942) 2006.