ABBA book revelations: AC/DC connection, the unlikely inspiration for ‘Mamma Mia!', more

USA Today

3 days ago

From 'Dancing Queen' to 'Fernando,' 'Knowing Me, Knowing You' to 'Super Trouper,' the polished pop of ABBA still glistens.
Beloved around the world, the quartet of Agnetha Fältskog, Björn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson, and Anni-Frid Lyngstad have remained mostly in the background in the decades since their 1970s domination, peeking out occasionally for a movie or theater opening (the staggeringly successful 'Mamma Mia!') or the debut of their live digital avatar show, 'ABBA Voyage,' currently playing in London.
In 2013, the quartet allowed Swedish music journalist Jan Gradvall access to them and for the next decade, he culled their personal stories for 'The Story of ABBA: Melancholy Undercover' (out now from St. Martin's Press, 336 pages).
The book reads as a thesis-like analysis of Swedish music and how ABBA's songs contributed to the globalization of pop culture. But Gradvall did extract tidbits about the origin of their hits and how ABBA became as much a business as a band. Those seeking juicy insights about intra-group dynamics or the dissolution of the marriages between Faltskog and Ulvaeus and Andersson and Lyngstad during ABBA's pinnacle should look elsewhere.
ABBA's is a unicorn of a success story – a band that won Eurovision in 1974 with the delectable 'Waterloo' and for the next seven years dominated the charts with flawless pop songs that shimmered on the outside, but, as Andersson once said, snuck in some 'melancholy undercover.'
Here are some highlights from the book.
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Ambient sound played a vital role in one of ABBA's biggest hits
Much like the Bee Gees have explained that the scratchy guitar intro of 'Jive Talkin'' originated with the band hearing the 'ch-ka-ch-ka-ch-ka' cadence from their car tires when they crossed a causeway into Miami each day, ABBA's 'Take a Chance on Me' also developed from unconventional influence.
Ulvaeus was an avid runner – a hobby he started as a way to lose weight – and would frequently go on 6-mile runs in whichever city ABBA was touring.
Before one outing, Andersson handed him a cassette tape of a new song that needed lyrics. As he ran the trail, Ulvaeus was aware of the rhythm his feet were making on the ground: 't-k-ch, t-k-ch, t-k-ch.'
The sounds blossomed into words – 'take a chance, take a chance, take a chance' – and an ABBA classic was born.
The song became the group's seventh No. 1 in the U.K. and reached No. 3 in the U.S.
The curious connection between ABBA and AC/DC
In order to tour Australia, ABBA was informed the country's musician's union required them to book an Australian band for shows back in Sweden.
Concert promoter Thomas Johansson liked the debut of a barely known Australian rock band – AC/DC – and, while worried no one would buy tickets to see them, booked them in 1976 at dance halls and on bills with bigger acts.
AC/DC earned an early fan base in Sweden after performing on outdoor dance floors (one show was billed as 'ballroom dancing') and with 'dansbands' including Bert Bennys.
ABBA's biggest fan was a notorious punk rocker
Sex Pistols legend Sid Vicious was known for violent outbursts, considerable drug use, and according to bandmate John Lydon (aka Johnny Rotten), loving ABBA.
In a memorable moment for at least some of the people involved, Vicious and ABBA were both in Arlanda Airport in Stockholm when a smitten Vicious spotted the band and started running toward them with proclamations of love.
Perhaps the vomit on his jacket propelled ABBA's security to quickly hustle the band away from the 'deathly pale teenage boy with a … dog collar around his neck,' thwarting Vicious from meeting his idols.
More evidence of Vicious' admiration for the glossy pop band came from a one-time girlfriend, Teddie Dahlin. In her book 'A Vicious Love Story,' she wrote that during the Norwegian leg of the Sex Pistols' 1977 tour, Vicious brought only one cassette tape on his tour bus – ABBA's 'Greatest Hits.'
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'Mamma Mia!' the musical emerged from an unlikely source
When it opened in London's West End in 1999, no one, including ABBA, could have imagined that a musical with a cute-if-flimsy plotline suffused with the songs of the Swedes would eventually play in 60 countries, including a 14-year run on Broadway (it closed in 2015 but returns Aug. 2-Feb. 1).
The backstory of the creation of 'Mamma Mia!' comes from an amusing source: salacious American daytime talk shows such as Jerry Springer and Ricki Lake.
The band didn't want a 'cheesy' musical, and book writer Catherine Johnson, a burgeoning playwright from Bristol, took inspiration from the outlandish parental stories as well as drawing from her own experiences as a single mother.
The English Conservative government at the time suggested that women got pregnant merely to justify government aid, a concept that 'upset me a great deal,' Johnson says in the book. That anger fueled the storyline of a mother and daughter with three possible fathers, but in a thoughtful, positive manner.
'Mamma Mia!' was also the first West End musical to have a female writer, a female producer (Judy Craymer) and a female director (Phyllida Lloyd).