|
Post by chron on Apr 26, 2017 2:18:34 GMT
Comparing the logo on GOLD to the cover of Arrival, the gaps between the letters look bigger; not a great deal in it, though. Edit: Jaki interposed himself as I was typing and posting this! Maybe they did it because the proportions of the 'original' make it look a bit lumbering when it's required to cover a bigger area of cover, as it is on GOLD. I can see why they decided to modify it slightly. Hang on; the reissue's the one of the right in your post, Liebers? Without a doubt. The ABBA text isn't in the Gothic typeface, and it's wider than the original Soderqvist logo (the subsequent reissued album cover on the right) Because it's the logo from the cover on the left of your post that looks more like the logo on the gatefold cover in Alex's post.
|
|
|
Post by chron on Apr 26, 2017 1:34:25 GMT
Looks like the standard ABBARTM logo to me; did they re-jig it in some way in 1992, then?
|
|
|
Post by chron on Apr 25, 2017 22:24:20 GMT
Go away, Polar.
|
|
|
Post by chron on Apr 22, 2017 21:19:08 GMT
I didn't say that the Beatles were an avantgarde band, I only said that it made some sense in the context of their time etc., something that would not in my opinion make much sense in Abba's context The Beatles basically made it make some sense by dint of simply doing it! They majorly helped to create the creative climate where such a thing was possible precisely by doing the unprecedented, by showing that commercial rock songs and a piece of avant-garde experimentation could co-exist on the same album! The Beatles were trend-setters; ABBA were trend-followers or trend-adaptors (very talented and skilful ones); which is possibly another way of saying what you're saying. Anyway, sorry Liebezeit. Enough thread derailing, back to: 'Frida' - The RSD Exclusive.
|
|
|
Post by chron on Apr 22, 2017 20:18:34 GMT
That would've been just silly, to say the least. Maybe something like that made sense for the Beatles or John Lennon, but not a group like Abba. I'm not saying that artists shouldn't experiment, I'm only saying that everyone has his own musical niche so to speak, and should stick to what he does best That then is the fork in the road. I know that such a thing would never happen (at least not in the form I suggested) with ABBA, but I don't think an idea of something like that necessarily silly or alienating. The Beatles had already pushed the boat out more than ABBA by the time they came to releasing Revolution 9 on the White Album, but it was still a completely left-field, unexpected and audacious move; miles away from what their "musical niche(s)" had ever been up to that point.
|
|
|
Post by chron on Apr 22, 2017 19:35:27 GMT
In my view it has little to do with Abba fans, it's just that most people in general don't care about this kind of music (what you call 'experimental'), so it shouldn't be much of a surprise. I don't always care to listen to it (sometimes I do, e.g. Vangelis' two albums of abstract electronica, or the Byrds country experiment, Sweetheart Of The Rodeo - see, an experiment doesn't have to be formally experimental), but I do often get off on the idea of it; that a popular artist is prepared to recklessly push-the-boat out in such a potentially career-altering way; the gesture of them doing it is often as important as the content of the work itself; is the content of the work, in a certain sort of way (I don't think that Lou Reed for one moment expected his fans to sit through all four sides of Metal Machine Music). Come on, doesn't the alternative-universe idea of ABBA proposing to release an album, one half of which will consist of a continuous, side-long atonal improvisation, tickle you?! Stig rocking back-and-forth with his head in his hands, as it gets the green light!
|
|
|
Post by chron on Apr 22, 2017 19:11:37 GMT
I have to say I don't really understand orf's post. No one on here has suggested that they're only interested in ABBA. I'm certainly not. The issue is whether a rare item can be obtained on Record Store Day. No one would probably ever say it; I'm commenting more on the generally feeling you get, on the basis of the focus of certain threads, the way their themes develop, or don't develop. I'd like to get more involved here, but don't sometimes know how to (I'm definitely hobbled by not having as wide a knowledge of ABBA's output as a lot of you), so I ended up doing a bit of a turn as devil's advocate, here. I'm aware it probably came across a bit presumptuous and arrogant (on top of not being strictly on-topic). It wasn't meant as an attack anyone specific, it was just done to stir up a bit of debate.
|
|
|
Post by chron on Apr 22, 2017 18:46:39 GMT
In any case, looking back at my reply, I didn't claim that Bush wasn't experimental (although maybe I made it possible for that to be inferred), I just said she seems to be a popular second choice artist for ABBA fantatics. I had thought that some of what I said might've chimed with you, shosh, as someone who'd had trouble drumming up interest in an M83 thread!
|
|
|
Post by chron on Apr 22, 2017 18:34:03 GMT
how much more experimental and eclectic could Kate Bush get? I thought this might get challenged and I almost put in the caveat that Bush is experimental, up to a point - as well as being hugely talented, you'd never get me saying otherwise (I have big problems with her singing voice, which essentially has two modes: frighten-the-horses banshee shriek and cloying coquettish, but that's for another discussion). But it's a polished, highly planned and contained, even-though-I-don't-understand-it-I-can-appreciate-the-effort-involved sort of experimental. She's never been, as far as I'm aware (and I'd welcome being shown otherwise) music-concrete-sound-collage experimental, like the Beatles (Revolution 9), or atonal feedback-and-effects-buzz raucous, like Lou Reed or Pat Metheny (Metal Machine Music, Zero Tolerance For Silence), or proto-ambient instrumental experimental like David Bowie (the second halves of Low and "Heroes"). She's been a very inventive and rich artist, no doubt about it, but always within certain limits As far as I know she's never risked alienating her fan-base outright, as those other artists have been prepared to do on occasion. That was the sort of experimental I had in mind.
|
|
|
Post by chron on Apr 22, 2017 13:32:01 GMT
That's why RSD is so flawed. I don't think even the shops know what they're getting, so even if you mention it to them there's probably not a lot they can do. Just an off-the-cuff thought here, and one that's playing devil's advocate a bit, but the pot-luck/lucky dip aspect of this type of event could be seen as having one positive side effect, in that it gives obsessive fans a chance to take a good look at their must-have-everything-in-triplicate urges. I've often thought that having a disproportionate interest in a single artist is a not altogether healthy thing in any case, and have found that people who have such obsessions can be quite dull, knowing all there is to know about one or two artists, and giving the indication of huge gaps elsewhere, in terms of their experiential handle on other stuff. They don't seem to have much of an urge to explore beyond their one true love, and you find that those few other artists they do like mine a similar musical seam to the one mined by their favourite (think of how many ABBA fans you know who like a bit of ambient/drone - a huge field, by now - say, or improvisational jazz, as opposed to how many you know whose second or third faves after ABBA are Queen and Kate Bush). It can't be a bad thing to broaden your interests and to develop as catholic a taste as you can, and maybe one upshot of a Record Store Day frustration is people thinking about that.
|
|
|
Post by chron on Apr 19, 2017 13:11:28 GMT
It was probably my fault [...] I'm so sorry. Don't worry about it, it was only a bit of Photoshop fluff (and wasn't done especially well, anyway). If a more appropriate thread comes into existence for that sort of thing, maybe I'll stick it up again.
|
|
|
Post by chron on Apr 17, 2017 22:32:22 GMT
Why would you post something unrelated to ABBA in the first place when the subject we're discussing is about the 'ABBA group photos'? (I seriously can't stand something that isn't relating to the topic, personally unless it kinda transitions slowly to another, sorry.) Well, there's the rub. I'd say it is related (it was a group photo that had been altered in a way that made the picture chime with me in a way the original photo used as its starting-point didn't). Also, since it riffed off a photo posted by Fafner's and relied on visual interplay with that photo to 'work,' this seemed the only logical place to put it.
|
|
|
Post by chron on Apr 17, 2017 22:03:03 GMT
Maybe I will, but only if there's an acceptable place to put it. The only reason I can surmise as to why it was removed is that it didn't chime with the essential concerns of this thread and was deemed OT to an unacceptable degree, since it wasn't offensive in the slightest, but it's odd that it's completely vanished rather than being put into a more relevant thread/section of the forum. Isn't there/wasn't there an ABBA Photoshop manips thread or something similar somewhere that could've housed it?
|
|
|
Post by chron on Apr 17, 2017 20:56:34 GMT
Spoilsports! Has that been relocated to a different section? I thought it was quite wry (as well as being, frankly, a little disquieting).
|
|
|
Post by chron on Apr 17, 2017 16:51:41 GMT
As you see on the Hoffman forum, these poor analog audiophile sods are chasing fairy dust and listening for things that they probably cant really hear. I feel sorry for them sometimes. Without wanting to derail the thread, that Hoffman forum is a bloody minefield, isn't it! I went there looking for some feedback on the recently released Vangelis Delectus boxed set, and walked into a storm about honouring the sound of old releases and the ethics of an artist adding fresh tonal colourings to their original recordings during the remastering process. A number there appear to have balked at buying the set because it's perceived that Vangelis has arsed around with the sound to an unacceptable degree (on the basis of the favourable descriptions gleaned elsewhere of the treatments given to the Opera Sauvage, China and Soil Festivities albums, I ended up pulling the trigger).
|
|
|
Post by chron on Apr 15, 2017 17:23:25 GMT
I can only vote for the tracks of the Something's Going On album, but before I do, I'll have to reacquaint myself with it, since it's been years since I listened to it all the way through and a number of tracks have completely failed to leave a mark on my memory. I'll submit some marks anon...ish.
|
|
|
Post by chron on Apr 14, 2017 23:18:52 GMT
[Y]ou could have at least state your purpose of the Frida mega rate, in an articulate, clear, and concise way to prevent the confusion. Don't leave us stranded for a scavenger hunt to your idea. Let them see your purpose being typed and then they (as well as I) can get the picture of what it's supposed to be. Aren't 'they/them' and 'we' and 'I'/'me' (you) all one in this instance? Isn't 'us' 'we'??
|
|
|
Post by chron on Apr 9, 2017 16:58:23 GMT
Maybe the interest in solo work of the ABBA members is really low here. I wonder if Agnetha Megarate would be more successful... In terms of this forum your best bet for whipping up interest is to announce an Agnetha Photo Megarate! (I sometimes think this site is as much an Agnetha fan site as it is an ABBA one.) That's very endearing; one of the most appealing things I've heard her do. I reckon that ought to make the top twenty of any Frida Megarate.
|
|
|
Post by chron on Apr 8, 2017 17:01:05 GMT
Is anyone bothered doing this? It's not a question of being/not being bothered, necessarily. I think it's unrealistic to expect more than a fraction of the interest that the ABBA Megarate thread generated in the old forum for this one, despite this also being an ABBA-oriented site. The fact is that a lot of people who really like ABBA's work are nevertheless only going to have a passing interest in Frida's (or Agnetha's, or Bjorn's or Benny's) non-ABBA/solo work at best. I've only heard Something's Going On by her; many will be in the same boat. For me, after the best of Arrival and The Album and the later work, I'm all about other great pop and rock (and jazz and classical and traditional) music made by other artists; not the formative chicken-in-a-basket-circuit-torch-song minutiae of solo Frida. Sorry, but there it is!
|
|
|
Post by chron on Apr 7, 2017 17:38:35 GMT
Lovely! the picture is new to me. As featured in the new CMP Complete Recording Sessions, innit! There's a page showing three or four photos taken from the same recording session. Apparently a 'project' featuring more taken from the same session is in the pipeline.
|
|
|
Post by chron on Apr 7, 2017 1:30:46 GMT
It's a bit difficult for me to say how much new material there is, as I never had the previous edition and I certainly haven't read all the other ABBA books out there. A lot of the information was new to me though. Is it worth the money? It's hard to say but I am pleased with my purchase. I've got an original edition of the book and I'm going to compare and contrast the two, when I get time. I went for just the e-version of this new edition and since, at this point, I haven't truly embraced the world of e-publishing, it'll take a little while to suss out which versions and app/device combinations work best for long-duration reading. I have had a quick scroll through the PDF version. The layout looks good, and there's a lot of info in there, but just looking at the early part of it, I'm happy I didn't shell out nearly three figures for the physical edition. Most of the pre-ABBA story holds very little interest for me, and that looks to be one of the areas that CMP has beefed up for this new edition - more in-depth-ish looking stuff about Frida and Agnetha's nascent singing careers and so on. Did those who ordered the physical edition get a gratis e-version thrown in as well, btw? They really ought to have done, or got one for a nominal cost at most (I suppose I should know the answer to this; throughout the long run up to the launch I received a host of emails, but didn't open the vast majority).
|
|
|
Post by chron on Mar 27, 2017 15:37:24 GMT
[T]he photos you've used is from the 1978 promo pictures of ABBA: The Movie... Shouldn't it be 'Voulez-Vous'? Oh wait.. Frida's moptop hair is synonymous with 1976 and 1978, though, so that doesn't matter anyway. I needed a photo where ABBA's heads align in a way that echoes the way the Kraftwerk heads align on the Computer World cover; chronology wouldn't have come into it, even if I'd known it was meant to pertain! Also, I created the lines of lettering by cloning and re-positioning the letters that made up the Kraftwerk album title (I tried doing new ones using a digital font, but the match wasn't that good). Since there are no 'V's freely available in 'Computer World' or 'Kraftwerk', and since (unlike 'I's) they'd be a bugger to create by chopping away at and re-layering and rotating bits of 'M' or 'W,' Voulez-Vous as a choice wouldn't have come into the running anyway! Have you been trying to match ABBA photo dates with the release date of the ABBA album being redesigned, and also match the position of the album whose cover is being pastiched in the relevant artist's release chronology to its equivalent in ABBA's output, then? Crikey! Matching covers with those of the Beatles' is tricky, since the Fabs put out more albums than ABBA (is Revolver 'equivalent' to Arrival, or is it Sgt. Pepper's, or both?).
|
|
|
Post by chron on Mar 26, 2017 23:41:16 GMT
I'll see your ABBA TEE design and raise you this!.. Could do with a bit more finessing, but you get the idea.
|
|
|
Post by chron on Feb 7, 2017 12:34:43 GMT
LAAPTMR would seem a shoo-in, being not just a final-sounding album closer, but basically ABBA's farewell to their life as a working band (yes, they carried on for a short while afterwards, but without the same sense of purpose or spark), and by extension, to life itself (the intimations of mortality are fairly blatant). But after thinking about it, I'm not going to go for this. I find I appreciate more the novelty of ending an album (Arrival, obviously!) with an instrumental (what vocals there are on it are used as instrumental texture). I like the way Arrival the track leads you away from the main body of the album and somehow makes you feel nostalgic for what you've only just been listening to; been in the middle of. It's the same band who've been wistfully watching dancing queens and recounting walks through empty houses, but here they come across as curiously self-contained and distant. I like its stateliness; after pushing some of the more basic emotional buttons, ABBA bow out with a bit of ceremonial restraint; faces stoically fixed as they say goodbye for now (are they leaving us - in that helicopter, growing smaller in the sky - or are we leaving them? After the arrival - and despite its title! - it certainly feels like a departure, at any rate). Arrival turns out to be ABBA's best closing track.
|
|
|
Post by chron on Feb 7, 2017 11:10:35 GMT
In recent years Chiquitita has begun to impress more and more. The words are some of Bjorn's best - articulate, affecting and rich, but without the overreach you tend to get with his later lyrics, when, to a degree, you feel he was trying to showcase his English fluency a little too much, which led to a certain stodginess. The singing on Chiquitita is classic ABBA-school of heartfelt; earnest but stoic, without the tip into melodrama or over-cookedness you get on things like The Winner Takes The Biscuit and I Let The Music Shriek. The tune, and blend of acoustic and gentle synthetic sounds is excellent, and the production touches (the vocal-echo and general reverby sound) and structure (the rolling piano into the fade-out coda, and the coda itself, are great elements) keep you interested. I've spoken about my liking for The King Has Lost His Crown in other forums and don't want to retread old ground, but it's the other stand-out track. As for a third nomination, I'm struggling; the rest trail so far behind Chiquitita and TKHLHC (with As Good As New and Kisses Of Fire destined to fight it out to avoid being given the wooden spoon) that I don't really care which one is trundling along in third place. DYMK might've been a candidate, if they'd opted to rework the lyric and move away from the song's somewhat troubling subject matter.
|
|
|
Post by chron on Feb 5, 2017 18:07:16 GMT
The original cover of 'Frida' could be inferred as an homage to Janis Joplin's Pearl Pretty blatant, isn't it. Frida's team were probably trying to prod the minds of potential punters into making a subconscious connection between the contents of Pearl and the likely contents of the Frida album. The Frida Ensam cover is broadly from the same 'school' of cover-design, as well - the boudoir setting, the inclusion of the chair, set close against a back-wall, etc. Looking at Frida Ensam again - despite its lovely treatment (that hand-colouring is really nicely done), the provocativeness of the original cover is a bit heavy-handed. Your revision scores marks over the original in terms of taste and restraint! Incidentally, looking at the two versions of Something's Going On again, I've now realised that the cover drawing on the original must've been based on the photo that you've selected for the cover of your revision version. The artist has candy-boxed it up a bit (softening the drawn look that's on her face in the source photo), but you can tell from the way that the strands of hair fall over Frida's forehead in the same way that it's based on that snap, or one from the same photo session.
|
|
|
Post by chron on Feb 5, 2017 17:17:37 GMT
It's mystifying why As Good As New is getting so many votes. It's one of the few ABBA tracks that could be lost forever and never be lamented. A powdery, affected throwaway!
|
|
|
Post by chron on Feb 5, 2017 2:42:41 GMT
Only just seen these. After a quick look, I think the most successful are the ones for Djupa Andetag and Frida Ensam. The one for Djupa Andetag distinguishes itself for one thing because the original is a bit of a mess(!), but you've managed to place a single image on a plain ground in a way that gives it an assertive strength. Since it's such a 'simple' idea for a layout, a single photo floating in the middle of an area of flat colour is hard to get right (it's one of yer amateur designers most used ideas, and often ends up looking, well, amateurish); you have to get things like the scale right between the two main elements, and use a background colour that offsets the photo harmoniously. In this case, the darkish areas of blue, green and grey work well off white, and the long vertical of the photo is nicely balanced against the columns of white at the sides particularly.
The one for Frida Ensam isn't better than the original, but it might be as good. The pink blush towards the edges softens the white, and the skinny typeface is attractive and seems to 'chime' with the time that the original album was made,in some way. I prefer the photo you've chosen over the original as a portrait of Frida, although the lighting and the hand-colouring of the original cover image are very well handled, and the typeface rounds it off really well. Your design reminds me of an another album cover, although I haven't yet figured out which one.
The least successful is the one you've done for Something's Going On, not the the original design is much better. The photo you've chosen isn't especially strong or flattering (Frida looks drained, which you could argue fits in with the theme of the title track, but I don't think that's a good enough reason to run with it); it hasn't been 'cut out' with much care, and the wall of grey text doesn't juxtapose well or make much conceptual sense. The drawing on the original is fairly horrendous though, isn't it, and the typeface choice and decision to angle the text are iffy too. The general colour of it is quite pleasing, if you squint at it so that you lose the detail and see the whole thing more impressionistically.
|
|
|
Post by chron on Jan 26, 2017 16:12:38 GMT
It's a toss-up between When I Kissed The Teacher and, oddly enough, since I've never really considered what a strong opening track it is before now, Mamma Mia. Eagle I'd rank slightly behind these two.
I think once you come to know and love the Arrival album, WIKTT could probably rank as the supreme ABBA album opener; that warmly strummed guitar taking your hand and leading you down a winding path, but MM's sparkling marimba pattern is etching itself into your memory from the opening second of your first listen, and if the salient function of an opener is to get your attention and keep you interested enough to hang around to listen to the rest of the album, then MM is probably the best. A surprise, as I say. (To veer off topic a bit, I was listening to some Wire the other day, when it struck me what a blatant homage to MM the opening of Madman's Honey is - it's also got the sort of catchy little chorus that B&B would thoroughly approve of, too!):
I agree with thisboycries about As Good As New; it's just about their least impressive kick-off track (I've never liked those prissy strings). What to put in its place? Probably I'd reinstate Summer Night City (with the extended intro - a good use of strings this time!) and lead-off with that. Alternatively, if I'm only allowed to jiggle the tracks that were put out on VV, I'd probably go with Chiquitita.
|
|
|
Post by chron on Jan 18, 2017 17:24:36 GMT
One of my favorites, lesser known, is Dirty Back Road. Great track - love that lean, slinky guitar lick and its pattern shift during the vocal breaks. In another little ABBA echo, a couple of times during this TV performance of the song, Kate and Cindy engage in a bit of curiously dispassionate frugging which somewhat calls to mind the 'string-pulled' shapes thrown by Agnetha and Frida during the 77 live version of I'm A Marionette.
|
|