ABBA (1972 to 1982)

Benny and Björn did not celebrate a visibly great success in Sweden. Only the song Hej Gamle Man made it to the charts. In 1972, however, their song She's My Kind of Girl, reached number 7 in Japan. They realized that English pop songs were better received and seemed to have greater success, and therefore wanted to rely more on them in the future. In addition, Frida and Agnetha were to be added more, since their voices harmonized as a foursome. So it happened that in March 1972 they recorded their first song People Need Love. However, they did not yet exist as a band, because all of them were simultaneously involved in other projects as solo artists. After the success of this song, the four recorded the album Ring Ring in the same and following year. Still in November 1972, the single He Is Your Brother was released.

The four also wanted to make themselves known in German-speaking countries and therefore appeared on January 6, 1973 in the German television program Disco. At this appearance at which the nameless band performed their first single People Need Love, however, they cheated a bit. Agnetha was 8 months pregnant at that time and due to that she didn't want to travel anymore. So on stage were Benny, Björn, Frida and Inger Brundin. Inger was a friend, but was introduced as Agnetha. Since they were not yet well known in Germany, no one in the audience noticed this change.

Two months later, when Agnetha was still pregnant, the four of them competed in the Swedish preliminary round of the Eurovision Song Contest. Although they were the audience's favorites, the jury voted them only 3rd place. Shortly after, they released the song Ring Ring in Swedish and English and had a huge success. They decided to qualify for the Song Contest preliminary again the next year.

That year, just before they started working on recording a second album, they decided to officially call themselves ABBA. The name is made up of the first letters of Agnetha, Björn, Benny and Anni-Frid (Frida).

In the fall of 1973, ABBA was again invited to write a song for the Swedish preliminary round of the Eurovision Song Contest. In the winter they wrote the track Waterloo, a modern song that broke out of old ballad schemes and seemed perfect for a duet. The group was given the place for the Eurovision Song Contest and shortly after released the single as well as the album under the same name. Both celebrated a huge success in Sweden.

On April 6, 1974, the Eurovision Song Contest was held in Brighton, England. The four attracted attention with their rather untypical performance. However, the audience liked the band and so it happened that they beat 17 countries by a clear margin and came in first place. This was the breakthrough of their international career. Their single Waterloo was broadcast in 54 countries as well as in the USA and played in the hits for weeks. In total, it sold over 5 million copies. In addition to Waterloo, the band simultaneously released the album Honey Honey. This however, was only successful in Switzerland, Austria and Germany.

Shortly after, another album followed and the four started their first major European tour. Unlike expected, the interest outside Scandinavia was not very big and their concerts were never sold out. Some concerts were only filled up to a quarter of the available space and others even had to be canceled due to the lack of interest. Nevertheless, in the following period ABBA could be seen in many TV shows, also in German language.

ABBA had success the next few years, playing sold-out concerts all over Scandinavia. However, there was more and more criticism of the band in the Swedish press. They were too "superficial" and "commercial". As before the name was fixed, no one was officially employed in the group, but kept the future open. Both women, Frida and Agnetha, released a Swedish solo album in 1975 and participated in other artists. Meanwhile, the band released its third record and had great success in Sweden. Internationally, however, this album did not make it far. It seemed that the great fame had gone back again. In the summer of 1975, during their Folkpark tour of Sweden, they released the single SOS. This song reached number 1 in the German charts and number 6 in Britain. This brought them great fame again, since the British charts had the most influence internationally. Also, this song gave them some style direction for their future productions. ABBA continued to appear a lot in television shows to promote their music and recorded music videos for some songs from the new album for the first time. After the music video for Mamma Mia was shown on the Australian music show Count Down in August 1975, the public rushed to hear and see more from this band. So it happened that the interest in ABBA in Australia grew more and more and one hit of them replaced the other in its charts. The band released a The Greatest Hits album almost simultaneously, which helped them to break into the international record market. It broke all records and played in the charts worldwide for weeks.

After the international breakthrough with Mamma Mia and Greatest Hits, ABBA experienced the most successful period of their career in 1976. In March 1976, the band released the hit Fernando, which sold over 600,000 copies in Germany alone and was awarded a gold record. In addition, ABBA had four number one hits in Germany in just one year, something that had previously only been achieved by the Beatles.

ABBA also broke records in television broadcasts. During a broadcast in Australia of recordings of the group, the show had an audience rating of 58 percent, which was more than the 1969 moon landing. ABBA also picked up very well-paid advertising contracts and got involved in collaborations around the world.

The day before the wedding of Swedish King Carl Gustaf and his fiancée Silvia Sommerlath, ABBA performed their new song Dancing Queen at the Royal Opera House in Stockholm. The song appeared on the market a month later on August 16, 1976 and sold over 6 million copies worldwide. It is still considered the typical and most popular disco pop track of the group. An equally great success brought the record Arrival in October, as well as Money, Money, Money and Knowing Me, Knowing You.

Since November 1976, a world tour was organized and prepared. The group ensured sold-out concert halls several months before the start of the tour. ABBA started in Oslo on January 28, 1977 and then played 21 more concerts in Sweden, Denmark, Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany and the UK. Then in Australia, they played 11 sold-out concerts in nine days. Six of them took place outdoors, giving more people the opportunity to watch the concert from far behind the barrier. During this time the feature film ABBA - The Movie was made. This was originally intended to be just a tour documentary.

After the tour, the musicians composed new songs, devoted themselves to the filming and tried to reconcile family and career. Agnetha was pregnant with her second child at the time and almost suffered a miscarriage. This was due to the heavy workload. ABBA was under a lot of time pressure and the individual members as well as Agnetha worked up to 12 hours per day. So the group decided to delay the work on the fifth album for a few weeks. So in October 1977 the first song The Name of the Game came out. The whole work under the name ABBA - The Album was released on December 12, first in Scandinavia. Three days later, the world premiere of ABBA - The Movie took place in Sydney and Perth. However, interest in Australia had visibly waned since the return from the world tour. On December 26, the film was shown for the first time in Europe, in Stockholm.

The media interest in ABBA's work was great, so no elaborate promotional tours were made. It was not until February 1978 that the band traveled to the UK and then to Germany, where ABBA - The Album went gold. The album and the single Take a Chance on Me were both awarded platinum in the British charts. Björn and Agnetha were already having big problems in their marriage at this time, which repeatedly led to loud arguments during work. Especially Agnetha withdrew more and more from the public during this time.

Nevertheless, the band traveled to the USA for two weeks at the end of April to promote their records. A lot of money was spent on advertising and ABBA appeared in several shows, which massively increased their popularity in the U.S. and ensured great sales. In the fall they made a similar trip to Japan. This also brought them great success.

While on May 18, 1978 Polar Music Studios was completed and they were working on more hits, Björn and Agnetha's marriage plunged into a worse and worse crisis. In the summer they tried marriage therapy, but it did not bring anything. On December 25, 1978, Agnetha left Björn and moved out of the villa with their two children. In public, the two still appeared as a couple and also remained both members of ABBA. Benny and Frida, on the other hand, got married on October 6, 1978, after nine years of engagement.

ABBA first introduced their song Chiquitita at a UNICEF gala in New York on January 8, 1979. The song landed a world hit due to the Spanish language incorporated and brought in an estimated one million pounds. ABBA donated all the proceeds to the organization UNICEF.

In February, the band traveled to Switzerland to record a music video for Chiquitita and the television special ABBA in Switzerland. Also there, ABBA released songs from their new album Voulez-Vous. One song from it, for example, was I Have a Dream. In the fall, among others, the song Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (A Man After Midnight).

In late summer, ABBA embarked on another tour to North America and later Europe. On September 13, they played their first concert in Edmonton, Canada. Later on October 3, the group was going to fly from New York to Boston. Due to a severe thunderstorm, the plane almost crashed and made an emergency landing in Manchester. From there they traveled on by van, which is why the concert in Boston started 90 minutes late. Agnetha, who had been suffering from fear of flying for years, suffered panic attacks from it, which is why they had to cancel the concert in Washington D.C. a few days later. She did not attend the visit to the White House, which the rest of the group did. During their third European tour in October they gave about 40 concerts all over the continent.

At the beginning of 1980, Frida and Agnetha recorded eight more ABBA songs in Spanish lyrics in Sweden. This brought them more notoriety in Mexico, Spain and Argentina. Meanwhile, Björn and Benny traveled to Barbados and composed new albums. In February they started recording the new album Super Trouper. The first single from it The Winner Takes It All was already released in July 1980. ABBA was internationally praised for having the best lyrics of all their songs so far. Björn Ulvaeus replied that he had it within an hour. In March 1980 ABBA made another tour of Japan where they were watched by a total of more than 100,000 people.

On July 2, 1980, Agnetha and Björn were officially divorced. The following February, Benny and Frida also separated. Despite the private circumstances, the four decided not to abandon their business projects and continue to make music together. In March 1981, ABBA began recording their last album, The Visitors. The record was released with its nine tracks on November 30, 1981. The music and lyrics reflected the current crises of the former two couples. It often sounded gloomy and melancholy. The songs are about parting and fear of war. But the last album of ABBA was also one of the first audio CDs in music history.

At the beginning of 1982 the group wanted to record another album, but managed only three singles. All four members went back to solo projects. Frida recorded a solo album, Agnetha starred in a film and Benny and Björn planned to write a musical together. Understandably, there was much speculation in the media about a breakup of the band. ABBA denied a breakup and, to counteract it, wanted to record more songs in the studio. Again they recorded three singles and released them in November 1982.

On December 11, 1982, ABBA performed as a group for the last time. In The Late Late Breakfast Show they sang the songs I Have a Dream and Under Attack. However, this did not happen live but via satellite as a live broadcast. On this day, the members announced a break of the band ABBA. In retrospect, this break is considered as a breakup, because since then there has not been a joint public performance. All went on to pursue their own projects such as recording solo albums or writing musicals.

In the following years ABBA was not simply history, but lived on through their music. This was still bought diligently and also the interest in a reunion remained for many years. The four members were always seen in shows and events and remained active in the spotlight.