ABBA: The Stories Behind Every Song

Review by Paul Carter

ABBA: The Stories Behind Every Song by Robert Scott

I received of a copy of this book this week and my first impressions are that I don't think I'm going to like it that much :-) The content of the book is basically the author going through the ABBA catalogue as is available on the 2001 remasters and giving his comments on every song. Some of them are quite entertaining, but there's a fair few Tobler-isms in there. And, yes, we get to hear about that famous ABBA album, Opus 10, once again and there a lots of quotes from Melody Maker etc. that look as if they are lifted directly from Toblerone.

The foreword to the book sets out to see 'what it is about this camp yet cunning body of work that makes it so memorable, so adored to this day'. Hmm.

Then we have the standard introduction to how ABBA came about, and I learnt that 'Benny was doing well as solo artist too, oddly enough as a purveyor of some radical cover versions'. Here we see the first of a set of pictures throughout the book of Björn and Agnetha from c.1978/1979 that I've never seen before.

Follow this with a brief sections on each of the four individual members pre-ABBA where we are informed that Agnetha is 'the one you noticed first and remembered longest, and particularly if you were male' and hear that old chestnut about Agnetha's trousers falling down when she performed on stage when she was five. To the author's regret though, 'there is no subsequent record of Agnetha ever reciting 'Billy Boy' or dropping her pants while onstage with ABBA'.

On to Benny, whose parents were called 'Costa and Efraim' and he was in a band called 'Elverlerts Spelmanslag' - um, well his father was Gösta and his grandfather Efraim and his band was called Elverkets Spelmanslag, but then again, why bother to check your facts or do any proofreading? Then I discovered that after the Hep Stars, Benny then teamed up with the singer 'Lotte Walker', and then wrote with Björn a song called 'Isn't It Easy?'. Central to Björn's influences in his early career was 'Stikkan Andersson'. Also, we learn that Agnetha's third album 'Sam Jag Ar' was shortly to be followed by Frida's 1971 entry to the Swedish Eurovision heats. I wonder if that's the same Sam that ABBA later sung about in 'Hole In Your Soul'? :-)

Then we're on to the actual reviews of the album, to start off with 'Ring Ring', for which quite a few songs get a good write-up, although 'He Is Your Brother' sounds as 'if it was recorded in a cement mixer'.

Through all the usual Eurovision blah and onto the 'Waterloo' album, where 'My Mama Said' is given high praise for the production, if not the lyrics. 'A corking track, a revelation'. On 'Dance (While The Music Still Goes On)', it's 'a shame that the boys just don't leave the vocals to Frida' (?) and 'Watch Out' is a 'sadly blatant stab at displaying how hard they are' and 'makes you want to jump up and down, pour lighter fluid over your head and annoy the neighbours at maximum volume'. On this song, 'ABBA actually kick serious ass'. Perhaps surprisingly, 'Suzy-Hang-Around' is also singled out for praise.

On to the 'ABBA' album, by which time 'Agnetha's bottom was provoking gallons of slavering, admiring male comment when Kylie was a mere infant' while 'for many, although Frida came into her own, Agnetha's the star of this album'. 'Mamma Mia' and 'SOS' receive high praise, although 'Hey Hey Helen' is a 'beserk bit of nonsense' and Frida sings like 'a bored nun' on 'Tropical Loveland'. 'Rock Me' is also good to an extent. 'So many times up to this point, his (Björn's) reedy pipes have allowed an otherwise perky song to die on its arse... but here, he has personality'.

Arrival is 'testament to ABBA's sophisticated, sincere vision of how panoramic pop can be'. 'Dancing Queen' and 'Knowing Me, Knowing You' are of course, brilliant, but 'My Love, My Life' is 'draggy and dreary', 'Dum Dum Diddle' is 'puerile wackiness' and 'Why Did It Have To Be Me' a 'duffer'. Of the title track, we are told that 'Frida was suffering from depression at the time of the Arrival album's recording and release. Maybe she'd had to listen to Benny writing and rehearsing this'. Quick run through ABBA - The Movie and the 1977 tour and on to 'The Album', for which all the songs receive fairly good write-ups. Nothing too interesting there.

Then on to the familiar tale of Björn and Agnetha's split and the 'Voulez-Vous' album, which is 'as close as ABBA came to their sex album'. 'As Good As New' is 'terrific' and 'one of the greatest beginnings of any album' while most of the other upbeat tracks receive similarly good reviews, especially 'If It Wasn't For The Nights' described as 'the best ever non-single ABBA album track by some miles'. But 'Chiquitita' is a 'maudlin ballad for grannies that kills the mood' and 'sounds uncomfortably like something you'd find halfway down a Tex-Mex menu', although parts of 'Lovelight' are 'brilliance'.

There's a rather nice photo of Agnetha from 1979 at this stage that I'd never seen before in a pink outfit. She looks really good here.

'Super Trouper' is a good album, too, with the only let down being 'The Piper' which 'is about as entertaining as a tracheotomy. ABBA lapses back into their cheesiest and most obsolete schlager tendencies for a god-awful dirge which defiled the B-side of the "Super Trouper" single'. 'Lay All Your Love On Me' is 'gorgeous' and 'poor old Elaine has a rotten time, whoever she is'. Then a reference is made to 'Benny's lyrics' on this one as being evidence that he was 'really growing up'.

The most damning comment in the whole book though is reserved for 'Put On Your White Sombrero' which is 'sung by Frida like an over-strident school ma'm with a janitor's broom up her jacksy... it's grim'.

Finally, moving on to 'The Visitors', the observation is made (to which the author presumably disagrees) that 'people who loved ABBA "ironically" think it's a tortured work of wrist-slashing genius. People who loved ABBA without knowing what irony was - i.e the vast majority of the world's population - just didn't get it, and so ABBA's golden age was about to come to an end'. The usual story about how ABBA came to an end is recited as well as the useful information that 'for a brief while they hovered around the prospect of another album - Opus 10 - but it didn't happen'.

The author has mixed feelings about 'The Visitors' - Frida's vocal on 'When All Is Said And Done' is 'one of her best, bristling with anger, sadness and regret'. 'Two For The Price Of One' is 'silly Beatles pastiche' and the punchline is dismissed as 'what a scream!' 'Should I Laugh Or Cry' is 'an extraordinary lyric, that fundamentally consists of her (Frida) slagging her man off for the duration of the song'.

'The Day Before You Came' is 'a song which dedicated Abba-philes swear by' and is 'closure with class', although I'm not so sure about the statement that Benny is 'the sole musician featured'. 'Cassandra' is 'drab', but 'Under Attack' is a 'crisp, inventive pop song'.

A quick run through the members post-ABBA careers plus a discography (where I read that 'Chess' was released in 1982). Some basic checking of facts and proofreading could have been done with here, as Agnetha's 'Nar en vackar blir en sang' album is mentioned, as well as several compilation albums that are made to look as if they were new releases. There is no mention of 'Djupa Andetag' nor any Björn & Benny releases post-1987. The ABBA discography is almost exclusively the UK version and looks as though it may have been lifted from elsewhere.

Then there are four books mentioned as sources - two of which are the highly reliable 'The Music Still Goes On' and 'The Name Of The Game'. As both 'Bright Lights, Dark Shadows' and 'From ABBA to Mamma Mia!' are also listed, it's a shame that no-one could be bothered to check some of the *real* facts.

So, all in all, one to add to the collection, with a few interesting photos and amusing commentary (at times), but not amongst the highlights of published material on ABBA, I think.

Thanks to ABBAMAILer Paul Carter London, UK