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Post by madonnabba on Feb 20, 2020 23:30:22 GMT
Just remember reading that Stig chose to release Fernando first after the uptempo Mamma Mia. Had he chosen Dancing Queen which was the alternative then Greatest Hits would have included Dancing Queen and Arrival would have featured Fernando as track No. 2 on Arrival. I love both tracks but I I think Fernando sits better on the Greatest Hits compilation although both tracks made it onto Arrival in Australasia.
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Post by chron on Feb 21, 2020 0:55:47 GMT
Two tracks featuring acoustic guitars to the fore at one after the other at the start of an album, the first developing into a skittery pop rocker, the second remaining a mid-tempo singalong strummer, wouldn't work as well as what we actually got. If we're to consider Fernando as a replacement for DQ on Arrival, rather than as an additional track, then I think it would have to be slotted in somewhere else. Thinking about it, My Love, My Life would work well as a contrasting track to WIKTT, so that would do fine moving up a place to track two, and then everything that comes after that would be as was released, with Fernando maybe tacked on at the end as the Side One closer?
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Post by Alan on Feb 21, 2020 22:58:23 GMT
Absolutely definitely not whatsoever!
Unthinkable. If nothing else, Fernando had already appeared (in Swedish) on Frida’s 1975 solo album. ABBA’s version is often (incorrectly) labelled a cover version because of this. I don’t hold with that view at all (three ABBA members appear on both versions) but the idea that this older song could launch a new ABBA album is unbearable. As it stands, Fernando was a new-ish song to promote a compilation of older ones. Quite fitting in that it had been released before, just like all of the other 14 tracks.
Even now, Fernando doesn’t sit well with me as a bonus track on Arrival. I know Aus/NZ had it that way originally but to me it would sit better as the final bonus track on the ABBA album. It nicely concludes ABBA Part 1, the way it did do on Greatest Hits (UK and US versions anyway!)
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Post by gazman on Feb 22, 2020 11:34:04 GMT
I guess the reason that 'Fernando' was placed as a bonus track on the 2001 CD version of 'Arrival' was because it had been included on that LP in Australasia...however, I agree with Alan that it feels that it would be better placed on the 'ABBA' album...
As an aside, does anyone else remember the decision to place 'Gimme Gimme Gimme' on the 1997 CD reissue of 'Super Trouper', which to me seemed even more strange, only it to be moved to 'Voulez-Vous' in 2001?
Also, although I understand that there is nowhere else to put them, even the inclusion of the 1982 tracks as bonus tracks on 'The Visitors' jars with me.
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Post by Alan on Feb 22, 2020 17:25:48 GMT
I can partly see the reasoning in Fernando being on Arrival - Dancing Queen and Fernando both had work started on them at the same time in 1975, and it was well after the ABBA album was over and done with - but the Greatest Hits connection and the fact that its b-side came from the eponymous album means that to me it’s not quite right on Arrival.
The reasoning for Gimme Gimme Gimme on Super Trouper was possibly that it was recorded well after Voulez-Vous was released. It could never have been on that album originally whereas (I think) most of the bonus tracks on albums (excluding the 1982 songs) could have been.
However, like Fernando, it was associated with a Greatest Hits that covered the previous album and before. Also, as with Fernando, its b-side came from that previous album. The clincher is probably that one more single from Voulez-Vous was released after Gimme, ensuring that it really didn’t sit happily on Super Trouper. Had another single from “ABBA“ arrived after Fernando, it probably wouldn’t have been added to Arrival but to ABBA instead.
The 1982 tracks... an unfortunate necessity for them to be on The Visitors... no where else for them to go, it was a dead end.
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Post by chron on Feb 23, 2020 0:28:23 GMT
Also, although I understand that there is nowhere else to put them, even the inclusion of the 1982 tracks as bonus tracks on 'The Visitors' jars with me. I'm not sure I get this objection: surely they just represent extra music, which doesn't have to interfere with the original album running order if you don't want it to - just program your player to omit the extras. One thing I liked about CDs when they arrived was that they made it clear that tracks on an album were more like artworks in a gallery than the chapters of a book or the scenes of a film - like pieces in an exhibition space, their positions could be changed, without creating disorder or sacrificing meaning. With CDs (and now with files and streaming) you can play tracks through in the original order to 'tell' one 'story', or create a new sequence (with omissions and additions) to tell a different one. Listening has become more of a collaboration of sorts between artist/album and the listener, rather than the latter passively observing the 'sanctity' of the original sequence. You could do this pre-CDs of course with a cassette deck, but it took more time and work, and the results in themselves were still inflexible. |
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Post by Alan on Feb 23, 2020 9:15:26 GMT
To me it’s always been sacrilege not to listen to a studio album - especially historical ones like ABBA’s - in their original running orders from start to finish. However, bonus tracks aren’t part of that other than they date from the same period.
I still haven’t worked out the best way to appreciate bonus tracks. Most of them are compiled on the bonus disc of “The Albums” CD box but not sure that format works either. However, they are definitely an unwelcome add-on to studio albums. Perhaps separate them into their own mini-album. For instance, “Arrival” and “Arrival: the bonus tracks” or, to borrow Pet Shop Boys’ idea, “Arrival: Further Listening”. There would be the six bonus tracks from the deluxe edition on this (the Spanish versions and Frida’s solo to make up the numbers).
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