There are various reviews and articles of "ABBA-The Reunion" in next week's TV magazines in the UK.

Frida is quoted as saying in the program that she misses Agnetha and would love to get on stage with the Mamma Mia! cast to sing again. She is also quoted as saying that "leaving ABBA in 1982 was a conscious decision by all of us. I never dreamt at that time that our music would linger on".

Then there is also this article in the Radio Times (18-24 September issue), written by Danny Kelly:

No Thank You For The Music

There's nothing more to say - Abba have no more ace to play

As yet another program continues to cement the position of Abba in the Parthenon of pop culture, I stand before you exposed as a freak. In making my confession I expect to be tied to a cart and whipped through the streets, but here goes... I do not like Abba, (whip!)... I do not understand the esteem in which they are held, (lash!)... I am the only person in Britain who does not own a copy of Abba Gold, (craack!). When I was a lad, and they were at the height of their powers, the Swedish quartet were, despite huge record sales, a laughing stock(holm). In a world where Slade, David Bowie et al were dressing up like sixth-formers re-creating a Martian disco, Abba (all leopard skin and legwarmers), somehow still managed to look ridiculous. And while Agnetha and Anni-Frid were undoubtedly winsome, there was something almost creepy about the beardy blokes. Only now, 30 years later, do we recognise what was going on: they were talented Swedish geeks who'd lucked into sleeping with gorgeous women; they were Sven-Goran Eriksson twins!

Nor did I understand the name. It's made up of the initial of the first name of the group's members - the two girls, plus Benny and Bjorn. But why Abba? Why not Bbaa? Or Aabb? Or Abab? Or Baab? And I certainly would have been more favourably disposed towards them if they'd been called Baba.

Then there's the music. Nobody can deny that the B and B part of Abba wrote a couple of decent tunes. Dancing Queen is the one song guaranteed to get middle-aged drunks shaking a tail feather at wedding receptions. Equally, I saw Elvis Costello and Dave Hidalgo (singer and accordionist with Los Lobos) prove how much aching beauty can be wrung from Knowing Me, Knowing You. But two fine songs do not legends make.

So how were a half-attractive, fairly competent pop group elevated to the status of deities? The answer lies, I think, in the way pop has become the soundtrack to our lives. People had to find something they could play in the car and the dentist's waiting room without scaring the horses. Fernando, Chiquitita and Super Trouper fitted the bill. Like so many things Swedish, (crispbread, Ikea, Saab), the group's blandness became their great strength. Reliable, workmanlike, styleless and impossible to detest, Abba, (whatever Tuesday's program tells us), are the Volvo estate of popular music. Let the flogging commence!

Thanks to ABBAMAILer Paul Carter, London, UK