Abba: infuriatingly clever sateen-flared Swedes – archive, 1970s

Abba at the Royal Albert Hall

By John Cunningham
15 February 1977

Abba’s arrival on the last leg of their British tour was heralded acoustically by a chopper whirling round the Albert Hall. Then briefly alighted four Euro-persons, snatching a visit here between completed US and approaching Australian tours. Two men, two girls: tight white pants, silver embellishments on shirts and tops. Pure yet sexy, pumping out their own version of songs on the not too solemn beat of happiness.

The group are Swedish – the blondness of three of them and the latent folksiness apart, you’d never know – and they produce a sort of elegant Eurorock pop that has been minting it for them since, appropriately, they won a Eurovision song contest in the early 70s. Waterloo it was, and again now, with Fernando, and Money, Money, Money and Dancing Queen.

Musically, they have not come a long way since their Eurovision win at Brighton. They haven’t needed to if success is all they are after since they have written and repeated formula-winning songs that thump and tinkle out their brand of sexual assurance that just manages to be recognisably different from anybody else’s.

They themselves wrote just about everything in this concert. It sounded good without meaning very much. But the you don’t need very much by way of lyrics to get a No 1 hit: “Money, money, money – must be funny in rich man’s world” will do. It has done very nicely for Abba, and their continued success – which cannot be quite as effortless as it seems – will probably be more of the same.

They have their dreams though, musically, to write something that promises to be a rock opera-musical. There were a few numbers from it – entitled The Girl With Golden Hair – in the concert. The familiar story of showbiz turning a starlet’s head is the theme; naive it was, and best forgotten in its present state.

So what does it leave for Abba, apart from their roots determinedly sunk in high-taxed Sweden? It would be unfair to say a one-hit show because, Dancing Queen apart, there is a lot of style and vigour that bounds between the wider shores of pop and rock. You’ve heard it before, of course. Still, nice to be able to put four faces to a pleasant sound.

Abba – The Movie

By Derek Malcolm
16 February 1978

Abba – The Movie (U) is timed to synchronise with the promotion of Abba – The Album. And much joy may the legion of fans of the Swedish pop group have of both. Lasse Hallström, the director and writer of this shrewd quasi-documentary, is quite as ace in the technical sense as they are, skilfully intercutting a daft little story about a Sydney disc-jockey trying for an in-depth interview with the endless procession of stereotyped stage numbers.

As a matter of fact, he succeeds no better than his panic-stricken radio hack (Robert Hughes) in getting under the silky skins of the quartet, as his constant shots of the blonde’s notoriously flashy rear-end desperately denote. But then, that’s the name of their particular game – look, listen, but don’t touch. A bland band.

Shallow rave

Robin Denselow explores the banality underlying Abba’s professionalism
10 March 1978

Abba are so infuriatingly clever that they have almost made mediocrity respectable. For that, I detest them. I detest them for their mediocre film that somehow just worked, for their computerised songwriting and immaculate studio production, and most because I actually like some of their songs. Last week I found myself voluntarily playing Take a Chanceon Me. Of course I quickly covered up with the Doors and Talking Heads, but the worrying fact remains that I had played an Abba track and liked it.
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Abba at Wembley

By Robin Denselow
6 November 1979

Abba on stage were actually up to the standard of Abba on record, which means they were quite incredible, or quite incredibly ghastly, depending on your taste. There can certainly be no half measures for Sweden’s all too visible and audible export who have now sold something approaching 150m records.

Personally, I hate what they stand for and think they are brilliant. The whole concept of the rock music ideal being nice, clean disposable family entertainment seems to me to be a contradiction in terms, but Abba are so infuriatingly clever and have written so many nice, disposable pop songs that they stay lodged in the brain, that they constantly prove themselves to be a very special case.

Those who have somehow obtained tickets for the first of their six London shows clearly thought they were more than special, for they stared at the stage with an uneasy overawed respect for the first hour, as if they couldn’t quite believe that the pin-ups had come to life.

Abba performed their non-stop bestsellers remarkably well, with a clean, plush set and clean, plush white and blue costumes to help them. Frida, the redhead, sang and danced better than Agnetha, the blonde, but their duets were fresh, clear and even spine-tingling. They managed to look very sexy but strangely clinical.

Benny meanwhile played surprisingly good keyboard and Bjorn pranced up and down looking slightly silly. The family entertainment angle was covered by the introduction of a choir of London schoolchildren joining with them on one optimistic ballad.

The youthful disco-pop angle was covered by a reminder of how many globally pervasive songs they have written – from the mawkish Fernando to the exhilarating harmony work in Take a Chance on Me and Does Your Mother Know. Their songs were exciting, and instantly satisfying, but somehow left me feeling slightly cheated. It was like eating a box of favourite chocolates and feeling hungry at the end of it.