Ask Ian

Edition 3

More answers from ABBAMAIL's Ian Cole
 the fountain of wisdom and knowledge when it comes to all things ABBA!

There’s many websites with MP3s and other music formats of ABBA’s songs on the Internet – you’ll find them listed in the “links” section of www.abbaworld.net. However, ‘Watch Out’ is freely available on the CD ‘Waterloo’, and personally, I don’t condone the sharing of MP3s of songs readily available.

I'd really like to download tracks from the now infamous 'Opus 10' album... is it really possible? Do the tracks really exist? Can you give me any information about them?

Is it really true that Agnetha is recording again? Steven Jones

Two questions in one! To answer the first one, there never was an album, working title or otherwise, called 'Opus 10'. This is a myth that sprung from a 1981 Swedish newspaper report on the recording sessions for what became 'The Visitors' album. Check the "Recording FAQ" page on Carl Magnus Palm On The Web http://www.bahnhof.se/~cmpalm/boxfaq.html for the full story. There is a bootleg CD called ‘Opus 10’, which basically includes the “previously unreleased” tracks from the ‘Thank You For The Music’ box set plus a few other songs that have appeared on countless other bootlegs. You can see the cover and tracklisting for this bootleg at http://hea.iki.rssi.ru/~lapa/opus10.htm.

To answer the second question, reports of Agnetha “recording again” have appeared roughly every 6 months for the past year or so. There are those “in the know” that say that the reports are true, and some reports even suggest that a single and/or album will be released later in 2001. However, there’s been nothing officially confirmed, and personally, I’ll believe it when I see it ;-)

1. What is the official title of the Spanish version of ABBA's Dancing Queen? On the album ‘Gracias Por La Música’ it is named ‘Reina Danzante’ on the album ‘ABBA ORO’ (Polydor 314 519 955-2) the name is ‘La Reina Del Baile’. Which name is the correct one?

2. Is there any date in 1994, all four members of Abba came together again for a radio/TV interview (especially in Great Britain)? I hope you are able to help me! Jens Mangelsdorf

Two questions for the price of one! To answer the first question, on ‘Gracias…’ ‘Dancing Queen’ was indeed titled ‘Reina Danzante’ (I don’t know Spanish, but I guess it’s a direct translation of the title), while on ‘ABBA Oro’ it was retitled ‘La Reina Del Baile’ (The Queen of the Ball perhaps?). I have no idea why the title was changed on ‘ABBA Oro’, but I have seen a Spanish LP from 1978 where it was also titled ‘La Reina…’. Possibly it’s a more “correct” translation.

Regarding the second question, no, there is no date to my knowledge of all four ABBA members coming together for an interview. Around that time Benny, Björn and Frida were together to receive awards for sales of ‘ABBA Gold’, but I’m unaware of any interviews that they may have done together. Aside from her 1996 authorised book, and answering questions for Carl Magnus Palm’s book ‘ABBA – The Complete Recording Sessions’, Agnetha has not given an interview since promoting her ‘I Stand Alone’ album in 1988. While the other three were interviewed for the 1999 documentary ‘The Winner Takes It All – The ABBA Story’, Agnetha declined and instead read excerpts from her book ‘As I Am’, which were played over silent footage of her taking a walk.

No, it was not a printing error. ABBA’s first album was ‘Ring Ring’, released in 1973 under the group name Björn & Benny, Agnetha & Frida, and was later re-released with the name ABBA on the cover. ‘Waterloo’ was the first album released with the name ABBA in 1974, and this was followed in 1975 by the album ‘ABBA’. The famous ABBA logo with the two Bs facing each other was officially introduced on 1 July 1976, and first appeared on the ‘Dancing Queen’ single released in August that year (and all subsequent releases). So all previous albums and singles did not have the ABBA logo, though on CD reissue, a version of the ABBA logo (not in the original News Gothic Bold font) has been added to those first three albums.

I’m not sure which album you might have, but I’m assuming that since you have an Australian address, it’s an Australian pressing. All the albums sold in huge quantities During the ABBAmania boom of 1975 – 1977 – for example, the ‘ABBA’ album sold something like 800,000 copies. All are pretty common in second hand record shops and record fairs, and I often see them for between A$5 and A$10. The only “collectors” value is the 1975 Australian pressing of ‘Ring Ring’ which has a unique cover, and the 1975 compilation ‘The Best Of ABBA’, only released in Australia and New Zealand, but still these can be found for no more than A$10.

 ABBA stopped recording together in 1982. Their last full album was ‘The Visitors’ in 1981, and this was in fact the first ABBA CD released (in fact, one of the first commercially available CDs ever released). The last album released while they were still together was the compilation ‘ABBA – The Singles – The First Ten Years’ in 1982. Since then both Agnetha and Frida released solo albums until they both retired from the music business in the mid to late 1980s. Frida briefly returned to the music scene with a Swedish album in 1996. Benny and Björn have written musicals (‘Chess’ and ‘Kristina från Duvemåla’), and Benny has also released solo albums of Swedish folk music. These days Agnetha lives a “reclusive” life, though rumours continue to circulate that she’s planning a musical comeback. Frida has been heavily involved in ecological causes, but has also retired from public life, especially since the death of her husband in 1999. Björn has been heavily involved in the musical ‘Mamma Mia!’, which uses 22 ABBA songs and opens in Melbourne on 9 June. Benny has some involvement with ‘Mamma Mia!’, and is also said to be recording another album of folk music for release later in 2001. Despite outrageous monetary offers for a reunion, it is unlikely that ABBA will record or perform in public again, though they have occasionally sung together at private parties over the past few years. You can find many sites with fuller biographical details in the “links” section of www.abbaworld.net.

Three completely different questions here (you sneak ;-) )! To answer the first one, to the best of my knowledge, there was never any recording, demo or otherwise, of ‘Turn Of The Tide’, which was apparently written by Agnetha, with lyrics by Björn, as a possible inclusion in ABBA’s 1979 tour. (refer page 93 of ‘ABBA – The Complete Recording Sessions’ by Carl Magnus Palm for more). In fact, there are those who suspect that ‘Turn Of The Tide’ may have just been an alternate title/lyric for ‘I’m Still Alive’, which was performed as an Agnetha solo number on that tour.

Second question: The first ‘ABBA Annual’ was dated 1978, but actually published in late 1977. Incidentally, the first two ‘ABBA Annuals’ (1978 and 1979) were also published under the title ‘ABBA Gift Book’.

Third question: Those original sheet music folios have been out of print for many years. ‘Compilation’ books such as ‘ABBA Gold’, ‘More ABBA Gold’, ‘The Very Best Of ABBA’ and many others have been released in recent years. To find those original books, I’d suggest an auction site such as eBay (www.ebay.com), Yahoo! Auctions (http://auctions.yahoo.com/), Amazon.com, or the many other auction sites around.