thisboycries' Megarate-style retrospective

The final chapter:

THE VISITORS

The Visitors - 11

I’ll admit it. I never saw this one coming. As massive an ABBA fan as I was, I never thought they had this one in their locker. I’d been waiting for these visitors and I didn’t even realise it! When I bought this album, I think I played this track a dozen times on the bounce. Maybe more. I was at university at the time and my neighbour knocked on my door that afternoon to say, bemusedly, “that song you keep playing sounds a bit like ABBA!” And he was right. Because this song was ABBA, Jim, but not as we knew it. In fact, it’s the sound of ABBA outdoing even themselves in terms of growing, evolving, exploring, experimenting, taking risks, pushing on, driving forward, embracing new technological possibilities, challenging themselves, asking bigger questions, tackling real issues, refusing to hide behind the familiar. The result is something quite stunning. What level's one up from a masterpiece? I’m not sure. What about those keyboard lines and interventions – every single one of them. They’re INSANELY brilliant! And that dark, disturbing, quintessentially proggy intro, doffing its cap towards ‘Duke’-period Genesis. And all those small but infallibly judged drum and hi-hat touches. Above all, what about that strange, attention-grabbing verse melody and its expert delivery by Frida, and that chorus which defies logic by effortlessly blending a chill, panicky numbness with undeniable singalongability – before verse and chorus lock together in blissful union at the end of the song. Quite sensational. But let’s not forget the lyrics. “The books, the paintings and the furniture…” Line after line after line of unalloyed brilliance. Like any truly great lyrics, they absolutely nail it while permitting – indeed inviting – multiple different interpretations. As with ‘Eagle’, I’m glad this wasn’t a single. It probably would only have got to number 25 or something ridiculously insulting and I’d still be fuming about it even now! No, things are better just as they were. I’ll simply file this ultra-hyper-mega-über classic under ‘Way, WAY Too Good for a Single’. Yes, world, just leave me alone with the title track of ‘The Visitors’ (and my books, paintings, furniture etc) and you won’t hear a peep of complaint or dissent from me.

Head Over Heels - 10

Talking of awesome intros. OFF! THE!! CHART!!! And what a song to back it up. Never have ABBA fused together happy-sad better than this. I don’t even know whether I’m supposed to feel happy or sad when I’m listening to it. All I know is it’s chock-full of great melodies and sublime musical touches. That falling, then rising keyboard pizzicato thingy in the intro. That backing vocal on “and with no trace of hesitation…” and “the world is like a playing ground…”. Those acoustic guitar flourishes. That pseudo-Hispanic fanfare after the chorus. That perfect, wryly amused ‘commentary’ vocal from Agnetha, and her vibrato on the final, beautifully elongated “heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeels”. That last piano ripple. Far, far too good for the UK Top Ten. To hell with the record-buying public. Let them satiate themselves on the Goombay Dance Band and other ‘big songs’ of 1982 instead. It’s probably some kind of back-handed compliment that they steered clear of ‘Head Over Heels’, its top-notch, simultaneously understated yet overwhelming song craft and its total mastery of the recording process.

When All Is Said And Done - 8

Blimey, here comes ANOTHER cracking song. It’s too much! I think I need a quiet sit down in a tranquil garden. Fabulous track. That driving, almost offbeat rhythm really thrusts it forward. Brilliant riffs and melodies continue to fall out of Benny’s keyboards. And Frida nails this vocal to a treetop so that everyone can see it. It feels like there’s a lifetime’s experience packed into these three minutes. Extraordinary. If anything, the song’s a little on the short side, which is my only major criticism. If we had to have 5 minutes of IIWFTN on ‘Voulez-Vous’, surely ABBA could have run to 4 minutes of WAISAD on ‘The Visitors’?

Soldiers - 7

After that trio of ludicrous excellence, you almost feel sorry for ‘Soldiers’. But pity is misplaced, because this song certainly holds its own. Tasty guitar riff. Is Ted Nugent back, albeit slightly medicated? I don’t remotely understand what this song’s on about and probably should have tried harder to fathom it. The only soldier I’m aware of known for his songwriting is James Blunt, so I’ll reserve judgment on the creative musical capabilities of the military. And no-one, but no-one, dances to a bugle. Is it all an allegory? Is it a parable? No idea. At times, it’s almost a nursery rhyme lyric. Overall, this is a song that shouldn’t work, but it does, I really like it and I’ve no idea why.

I Let The Music Speak - 8

First ABBA gave us a mini-musical in four songs. Now they give us a mini-musical in five minutes! Dammit, that’s clever! More creativity in one song that you get on many entire albums.

One of Us - 5

Sorry – I remember being bitterly disappointed when this came out as a single and I haven’t greatly changed my opinion after all these years. It just seems like ABBA by numbers, thematically and musically, with an annoying reggae-style beat trying to deflect attention from that fact. ABBA had rewritten the rulebook on break-up songs when they came up with KMKY, so revisiting that same kind of territory but in much less creative fashion just isn’t going to cut it for me. To my ears, for the one and only time on this fabulously inventive album, they sound a bit jaded and short on ideas.

Two For The Price Of One - 9

Don’t worry, I’m really not going to try to defend the indefensible. I’m just going to say that, for me, the chorus on this one is right up there. Impeccably constructed, the way it intertwines and interlocks is a thing of almost mathematical or architectural wonder – like a Wren church or one of Brunel’s inimitable civil engineering triumphs. Kind of. And the piano behind it! But, most of all, that backing vocal “if you are dreaming etc….”, “weeeeee may be the answer etc…” – the latter being another of my top ten ABBA moments. That three-note guitar riff, too, is a thing of beautiful simplicity. That oompah outro, meanwhile, is a leftfield treat. Personally, I don’t think ‘Twofer’ breaks the flow of this album at all. Far from it. Dripping in melancholy and vulnerability, its humorous approach links back directly to ‘Head Over Heels’ on (old) Side One, keeping things balanced and giving the whole album equilibrium. Overall, a stupid, silly yet strangely touching song that I love, love, love.

Slipping Through My Fingers - 10

Is this ABBA’s finest ballad? I think it’s got to be. It’s one to make grown men and women weep and strong-and-silent types blub into their tall skinny lattes. Unfeasibly beautiful melodies, genius concept, pitch-perfect lyrics, devastating – no, CRUSHING – last 15 seconds. A song that absolutely gets to the core of being human. And you can’t possibly ask any more of any band than that.

Like An Angel Passing Through My Room - 9

Oh, dear God. Just when our emotions have already been put through the wringer by STMF, and we’re battling the grief of passing time, we get that bloody ticking clock and the music box! I think it may actually be too much! Nostalgia on a stick. Images of fantastical, idyllic Edwardian childhoods. Of the glow of candlelight and the whisper of soft, comforting words. Finish me off, why don’t you, ABBA? I’m done here. Again, genius concept, absolutely impeccably delivered. So often, ABBA go ‘big’ in sound and approach. Stripping it all down like this, for what will be their last proper album track, is the perfect, unexpected final destination on an incredible, inimitable eight-album journey – boy, we’ve come long way! – a journey that fittingly ends with us all tucked up in bed for a well-deserved, dreamless night’s sleep.

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Plus:

Should I Laugh Or Cry - 5

Fairly pleasant but rarely lingers in the memory. I’ve forgotten it again already.

I Am The City - 5

Not a big fan. As I’ve said before, sounds like a Bucks Fizz or Buggles b-side. (No offence meant to Fizz or Buggles, both of whom I’ve a lot of time for.) Trying too hard to sound relevant. In particular, I can live without the ‘funny smell’ lyric. Yuk. Guys, it’s over. It’s been an extraordinary ride but I think your band’s reached the terminus.

You Owe Me One - 6

Almost falls into the same trap as IATC, but avoids the pit and comes up with quite a neat, jaunty little chorus.

Cassandra - 6

Undemanding but enjoyable enough. They’re going through the motions here, it’s clear, but ABBA going through the motions sound better than most bands going at it full tilt.

Under Attack - 5

No better than a slightly disappointing b-side, by ABBA’s Olympian standards. Inoffensive and competent, but that’s a classic case of damning with faint praise. This is the sound of a band whose heart’s not in it anymore.

The Day Before You Came - 7

Extremely clever song that came a couple of years too late. I’ve never known why it doesn’t grab me more than it does. Maybe it’s because the melody for the line “the day before you came” lacks that little bit of magic dust. But a perfect swansong record whose ludicrously low chart placing shows just how far the wheel of musical fashion had turned. And good to see, before the band check out, Benny finding one last sublime keyboard pattern (in terms of his ABBA days), which starts at the close of the “watching something on TV” line. At the end of the song, you can just visualise them gathering up their things, flicking off the light switches in the studio and, collars turned up, heading off in four completely different directions in the early-evening Stockholm rain.

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Well, that’s it. What can I say? Thanks for reading all, some or any of this! It’s been emotional! Just to sign off, here’s my personal pecking order of ABBA albums:

The Visitors

ABBA

The Album

Super Trouper

Arrival

Voulez-Vous

Ring Ring

Waterloo

Great comments, thisboycries, on The Visitors tracks. They made me realise, again, why it's my favourite ABBA album. Agree totally with you and Tony about the title track. It would get 11 from me, too. I remember, vividly, the first time I heard that four bar build up to the first chorus and Benny's compelling riff; and Frida's fantastic vocal. What a track!

Another one here happy that The Visitors' title track gets picked out for a big mark and special praise (I can't find/got rid of the list I submitted to Ginger Spice in 2016, but think I must've given it 9 at least, possibly a 10). It's an excellent track, chilly and stark-sounding to match the murk and intrigue of the subject matter - that pulsing, probing opening evoking night-fog and floodlit Todesstreifen and search squads in pursuit. Frida's vocal approach on it is really curious (which is also fitting). Her character sounds as resigned as she does hunted and/or haunted; this comes from the strange, slowly-enunciated way she intones some of the lines (aided by that swirling, phaser-like treatment on her voice), as though intrigue and wonder have mingled with fear and repulsion about what lies on the other side of the door to exert a peculiar, perverse pull (or maybe it's just trying to indicate that the character is tired of all the subterfuge and uncertainty). At any rate, there's a compelling split between words and delivery: the former urgent or imploring and the latter sardonic, measured and accepting. That all said, the lyrics are a little clumsy here and there: 'door knob' just doesn't bed well, for example ("someone tries to force the door lock," although still not great, would've plain sounded better, while reinforcing the entrapment theme at the same time). Still, an outstanding track overall, the strongest and best on their final album (and a very strong runner for best opener on any ABBA album, although, for me, Eagle outpaces it with puff to spare in the straight; it's finally a more immersive and satisfying musical experience, majestic and expansive, plus some of the instrumentation on The Visitors hasn't aged well (I'm thinking in particular of that synthy horn that parps away at the end of the chorus).

Note to self: try to make do with fewer brackets