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I’ve recently had the opportunity to catch the tribute band that goes by the name of “ABBA - The Music” and has previously performed under the names of “ABBA ­ The Show” and “Waterloo.” And to make a long story short, despite the lack of a consistent band name, I was extremely impressed by what I saw.

Prior to seeing ABBA ­ The Music, I had seen I had previously seen Björn Again on two separate occasions here in San Diego and BABBA while in Australia for the Aussie Mamma Mia! premiere. Björn Again is arguably the most well known ABBA cover band and in fact, is like a well oiled machine with several incarnations touring the world to spread the joy of ABBA music to all the corners of the world. I personally enjoyed the two performances I have seen by Björn Again, despite the apathy spewed by some of the more adamant ABBA fans towards Björn Again for their “fake” Swedish accents, parody-style performance, and sticking to basically the songs found only on ABBA Greatest Hits collections. Whatever their alleged crimes to the ABBA legacy, the simple fact is they are a business that caters to the average person who probably only owns ABBA GOLD. What they provide is an illusion of ABBA that is very much in line with what the general public would be interested in seeing.

Before I saw BABBA, I was told they were infinitely better than Björn Again and they present a more accurate image. Personally, I couldn’t tell much difference between BABBA and Björn Again because they also had “fake” Swedish accents and pretty much stuck to songs found on the Aussie version of ABBA Gold. Perhaps the only real difference is that the stage banter was not the parody style used by Björn Again to entertain the audience between songs. But aside from this one difference, BABBA was just as guilty as Björn Again in these alleged crimes against the ABBA Legacy and yet, BABBA was okay to like and Björn Again wasn’t. I certainly enjoyed BABBA, about as much as I did Björn Again, and yes, I will say it here, I certainly don’t mind Björn Again’s attempt to inject some comedy/entertainment into their performance. People attending the shows of these groups are there to have a good time, set to the tune of ABBA, and that’s what they get. And to me BABBA and Björn Again do the same exact thing.

And this brings me back to the performance by ABBA ­ The Music. ABBA ­ The Music are a tribute band that actually come from Sweden. The Swedish accents are legit. And they performed with a varied selection of songs that included the hits but didn’t exclude the opportunity to cater to the true fans of ABBA by adding non-greatest hit songs such as Intermezzo No. 1, So Long, and Hasta Mañana as well as starting out S.O.S. in Swedish until the first chorus and then completing the song in English. Stage banter was kept to a minimum in what to me seemed like an effort to get as many songs in as possible. In addition to performing wonderful renditions of the songs, they also brought out a couple of “guest performers” who were actual musicians who played with the real ABBA and every time they were out on stage, would acknowledge them in tribute to their roles with ABBA.

I think another highlight was despite the fact the band members were dressed to look like ABBA members, there wasn’t any interaction between them using “character” names to perpetuate a sense of “acting.” So even though the brunette looked like Frida, she was never called Frida and likewise for their version of Agnetha. In one occasion each, the “Frida” sang an Agnetha track and the “Agnetha” sang a Frida song. Only an ardent ABBA fan would notice, but I would assume they made the decision to do that because the songs either sound better or are easier to sing for the opposite girl than forcing the “correct looking” one to do it.

In many ways this truly felt like the first ABBA Tribute show I’ve ever seen, all the rest have been ABBA parodies trying to parade themselves as tributes. This felt like a very loving tribute and certainly one I would highly recommend seeing. “ABBA ­ The Music” are the best ABBA tribute band I’ve ever seen. And despite ABBAMAIL headquarters’ preference for the tribute band, Arrival, I’ve never seen them. I do have their album and find their voices appallingly screechy and barely listenable. I hope they sound better in concert.

Saving the best part for last, the thing that amused me the most about seeing “ABBA ­ The Music” is that their opening was Super Diamond, a Neil Diamond tribute band. I had to laugh at the fact that a night of fake ABBA and fake Neil Diamond was able to fill the Hollywood Bowl, which has a maximum capacity of 17,965. If it wasn’t completely sold out, it looked very close to being full as far as I could see from my seat. I did not know the capacity of the bowl before seeing it and wasn’t prepared for how massive the venue was and I was amazed there were so many thousands of people there to see two tribute bands. Who would have thought it possible that so many people would show up for these bands and neither one being the original artists? In any case, I now feel like I’ve seen the next best thing to ABBA since there is no chance to see the original in concert aside from on DVD.

Ryan Cameron