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Post by Michal on Mar 13, 2021 19:47:55 GMT
richard, I guess Universal would not want ABBA to tell us now that the new songs are part of their plans for the 50th anniversary celebrations. They're definitely working out a careful strategy, planning various releases and promotional activities and they will reveal them one by one when the time is right. However, I agree with you that it would be fair to admit that the new material won't be released this year, if they already know it.
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Post by justabba on Mar 13, 2021 20:28:44 GMT
No song this year would be very tough. Even if it makes it just in December that would be something!
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Post by justabba on Mar 27, 2021 7:13:18 GMT
Bjorn revealed yesterday, via a zoom call, that the ABBA digital copies performances will be held in London in a new purpose built stadium....
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Post by foreverfan on Mar 27, 2021 10:56:07 GMT
Its all very frustrating for all concerned i guess, but hey lets hope it all comes to fruition as soon as possible.
I tend to forget it all as much as I can, its only when we get snippets that it comes to the fore again.
A Christmas ( are we already talking about Christmas !! lol ) release would be nice, but the arguments for and against are always present, lost in the melee of crap releases etc....
as per usual ... we wait....
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Post by richard on Mar 27, 2021 15:24:51 GMT
I wonder what the average age of an ABBA fan is now? No idea, really, but about 55, say? (Allowing for younger and older fans when the group were active, and the younger fans since.) I ask because who is going to be all that interested in buying no doubt expensive tickets to watch some holographic (?) manikins - no matter how brilliantly realised - mining to a few new songs and the familiar songs for which there are already videos? I'm sure most people just want to hear the new songs. But for those involved with the avatar project that's probably not interesting enough or sufficiently commercially rewarding, according to their hopes and plans and projections.
So we wait, as Graham says - for as long as it takes, I guess, for the avatar show to be up and running.
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Post by onlyabba4meagain on Mar 27, 2021 15:26:04 GMT
London is a very good choice - for The ABBAtars, (Static), 'Show', if you live in the UK. But, it is a lot more expensive, (to see the ABBAtars), if you live on the Continent, or outside of Europe - USA, Australia etc. ABBA Fans, who see it from those places, would pay a fortune, in Travel Fees, Hotel Fees and Fees to get into The Venue. So, we UK ABBA Fans, are very lucky. If and when the UK ABBAtars 'Show' ever opens, that is. Some ABBA Fans want 'The Show' to be Streamed, but, if ABBA did that, they'd, (potentially), have a lot less People, who actually come to see it, at The Venue. A compromise, would be an Album, of 'The Show'. That would be ABBA's Songs, but - maybe - with, some 'Remixed' backing Music, which would be the 'Live Band', at 'The Shows', being allowed to change a few things by Benny & Bjorn - who would Produce the Album - of course. The 'New' ABBA Songs, would also be on it - 100% certainly. ABBA could actually use The ABBAtars to do New Videos for all of their Singles They could also create Videos for many of their Album Tracks, such as 'As Good As New', 'If It Wasn't For The Nights', 'Angel Eyes', 'Kisses Of Fire', 'When I Kissed The Teacher', 'My Love, My Life', 'Dum Dum Diddle', 'Why Did It Have To Be Me', 'Tiger', 'One Man, One Woman', 'Move On', 'Hole In Your Soul', 'I'm A Marionette', 'Andante Andante', 'Me And I', 'The Piper', 'Our Last Summer', 'The Way Old Friends Do', 'I Let The Music Speak', 'Soldiers', 'Slipping Through My Fingers', 'Like An Angel Passing Through My Room'. Plus - Videos for Non-Album 'B' Sides: 'Lovelight', 'Elaine', 'Should I Laugh Or Cry', 'Cassandra' etc. They could use ultra Modern 'Special Effects' in the Videos - making them look far, far more impressive, than ABBA's 1970's and 1980's Videos. The ABBAtars would be in them all - looking as ABBA did in 1979. They could be released on several DVD's. It would be great. I'd rather have that than The ABBAtars London 'Show', which most Fans won't be able to afford to travel to see. Even as far back as the 1990's, the Spice Girls Videos looked very impressive, with their Computer Generated Graphics. Especially the Video for 1998's 'Spice Up Your Life' Single. ABBA are now able to create even more spectacular Videos, than that. A little - personal - Promotion for Abba: ABBA -- THE ALBUMS -- 9 CD BOX SET -- (2008)
Amazon usually sell it for around £34 to £37. They have currently lowered the Price to £17.99. It is a Bargain, at that Price. NOTE -- Amazon have just put the Price back up. It is now £16 more expensive - £34.40!!! www.amazon.co.uk/Albums-Abba/dp/B001F9Y2CM/ref=sr_1_8?dchild=1&keywords=abba&qid=1616856225&s=music&sr=1-8 |
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Post by foreverfan on Mar 27, 2021 16:39:05 GMT
I know we have touched on the subject before as Colin mentions above, "new " videos for all those tracks that haven't got one...
Personally Im not against a little remixing etc as well. The originals are always going to be there, but Im sure they, the boys ,would love to "update", being music creating naive, I guess there are many more ways of composing these days, and after all the boys have changed lyrics before, ( Mamma Mia ) us die hards probably find it sacrilege, but it did work..... The whole "new" fan base really wouldn't know any different.
Im not to bothered about the Avatars, if in London it will be price dependent, but if anything like the holograms in the museum, forget it, However Im guessing its going to be a lot better and more realistic...more sophisticated.
Lets be honest, this is probably going to be the last throw of the dice, age is against them ( and us !! ) .... so hopefully they will go out with a bang.
As for average age Richard.. I don't think your far off the mark give or take a couple of years.. Im 58 !!
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Post by justabba on Mar 27, 2021 18:43:28 GMT
58 here too...personally its the new songs I'm excited about. The digital concerts less so, although I'm more likely to go now it's in London. All along the new songs were a promotional tool for this project so we definitely won't be hearing them until the project is ready to start booking tickets...
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Post by justabba on Mar 28, 2021 11:14:53 GMT
Work on the concert in London, September 2020  |
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Post by chron on Mar 28, 2021 19:29:57 GMT
[W]e UK ABBA Fans are very lucky. Or not, depending on how much of an exercise in kitsch self-idolatry you believe this avatars exercise to be. Certainly, a 'purpose-built stadium' seems extravagantly needless, and not especially 'green', unless they've taken an existing building and are making not-too-drastic modifications to it. |
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Post by justabba on Mar 28, 2021 20:30:33 GMT
I would be surprised if its brand new. Far more likely a renovation....
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Post by chron on Mar 29, 2021 15:12:10 GMT
In that case they should've used a less grandiose description, such as 'purpose-adapted renovation'. 'Arena' or 'performance space' would probably fit better than 'stadium', a word usually used in relation to huge banks of seating housed in a structure that is partially open to the elements in some way.
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Post by gazman on Apr 11, 2021 21:13:08 GMT
The description of 'stadium' was probably used off-the-cuff by Björn, so we ought perhaps not read too much into it...it does indeed sound more plausible to me that an existing venue or performance area will be adapted specially for the ABBAtar experience.
Personally I doubt whether there will be any more news on either new ABBA songs or the show until it is all ready to be unveiled and tickets offered for sale. Perhaps we will be consoled in the meantime with a new solo track from Agnetha, should that particular rumour turn out to be true!
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Post by onlyabba4meagain on Apr 17, 2021 7:19:22 GMT
It looks like we will not even get 1 'New' ABBA Song, until sometime in 2022.
Therefore, it is best if we stop expecting anything in 2021. We wait and wait,
and nothing ever happens. If we expect Zero, then we can't be disappointed,
if we get nothing...
Here is a Bjorn Interview, from today's 'The Times'. (UK Newspaper).
One part part of the Interview, suggests 5 New ABBA Songs. Another part makes it sound like there may 'only' be 2 New Songs.
ABBA Take A Chance On Avatar Tour
Saturday 17th April 2021
by David Sanderson & Neil Fisher
ABBA will sound slightly different from the pop perfection of the 1970s as they perform on their “avatar tour” next year, Bjorn Ulvaeus,
the band’s songwriter, has admitted.
There is little the band members can do about the ageing of vocal cords.
Ulvaeus says in an interview with The Times today that Agnetha Faltskog and Anni-Frid Lyngstad, now sang in a lower pitch.
“Their voices are about one tone lower, perhaps,” he said.
“It still sounds very much ABBA,” he insisted, however.
The four members of the band, who rose to world prominence when they won the 1974 Eurovision Song Contest with Waterloo,
before splitting in 1983, have recorded five new songs for the tour, their first new material in nearly 40 years.
Ulvaeus, whose marriage to Faltskog broke up in the 1980s, as did Lyngstad’s with Benny Andersson, the other band member,
said that it had been easy to recreate the studio chemistry that led to such classics as Dancing Queen, Super Trouper and
Knowing Me, Knowing You. Despite the marital splits the four had remained close.
“We are really good friends and we see each other quite often,” he said.
“Being together in the studio again, it was so familiar. It all came rushing back in seconds. We had fun. You have to have fun.”
The tour, which will feature holograms on stage, was pushed back to next year by the pandemic, allowing more time to perfect
the technology of their “Abbatars”. The show will feature at least two new songs, I Still Have Faith in You and Don’t Shut Me Down.
The band has retained a loyal following while attracting new fans with the Mamma Mia! musical and two films.
Ulvaeus, 75, has explained how the band members were “photographed from all possible angles” to create the avatars. “They made
us grimace in front of cameras,” he said. “They painted dots on our faces, they measured our heads.”
He said that none of them was keen to tour. “We never were, really,” he confessed. “We had a ten-year career and out of that we may
have toured six months.”
Ulvaeus agreed that it would be weird to see a virtual version of his younger self. The band are also collaborating on a Pippi Longstocking
musical, which they hope will open in Sweden before touring in Britain and the US.
Ulvaeus said that he had written lyrics for the new ABBA songs while Andersson did the music, as they had done since the 1960s, when they
teamed up in a folk band called the Hootenanny Singers.
“Benny was always the musical genius and I was the word man,” he said. “So it’s a natural development.” As natural as the voice lowering
with age.
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Post by gamleman on Apr 17, 2021 8:34:35 GMT
Thanks for posting this article.
I would interpret that as there being five new songs of which at least two will be used in the Abbatar show. I don't think they will use all five as they will need to leave time for a good number of classics. And given the technological effort needed to put on this show, I doubt that it will as long as a conventional concert, so not as many songs, but I may be wrong.
The first part of the article makes it sound like ABBA have re-recorded all the songs for the show in their more mature voices, but I suspect this is journalistic imprecision and Bjorn was just referring to the new songs. It would have been quite an effort to re-record all the vocals.
The Pippi Longstocking musical is an interesting development, as it will tour the UK as well as Sweden. The article says the "band" are collaborating on this project - does this mean the whole of ABBA? I suspect in reality it will be just Benny and Bjorn.
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Post by stepalm on Apr 17, 2021 8:54:38 GMT
I still didnt get if they are gonna use the voices from ABBAs tours and the Dick Cavett show combined with new music. I have guessed so but coming to The winner takes it all their are no live vocals and i guess it will sound strange if the put the original recorded voice with a live band so I kind of hope that we will get a new studio recorded live vocal for some of the songs.
The ones I would love to here in newly recorded versions are:
The winner takes it all
Our last summer
Lay all your love on my
When all is said and done, hopefully in a less disco versionk, I love the lyrics on this one.
Most other hits exists allready in live versions except On of us and The day before you came but Im not sure if they would fit for live versions.
Another that would be heavy to hear live is The visitors but its not very well known.
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Post by justabba on Apr 17, 2021 10:51:14 GMT
I certainly didnt get from the various articles no ABBA releases this year.it only referred to the avatar tour being next year. At least 5 songs has been mentioned so many times and it only says 2 at least of the new songs for the tour. But perhaps I'm reading it all wrong?
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Post by richard on Apr 17, 2021 12:22:03 GMT
As of now, for me, these intermittent bits of information, news - call it what you will - about this whole thing, becomes less interesting, it's been going on so long.
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Post by jj on Apr 17, 2021 12:50:50 GMT
These "new" songs are now quite old. When we hear them, it'll be like they'd been released from the vaults, a bit like it was when we first heard "I Am the City" on More ABBA Gold, in 1994.  Referring to them as "new songs" will soon be a bit daft. |
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Post by justabba on Apr 17, 2021 17:45:58 GMT
Bjorn is rumoured to be interviewed via zoom on BBC breakfast on Monday to discuss new ABBA plans....
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Post by tagaytay on Apr 18, 2021 11:55:22 GMT
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Post by justabba on Apr 19, 2021 6:35:54 GMT
Bjorn confirmed on BBC this morning all 4 have been meeting with masks and testing etc
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Post by onlyabba4meagain on Apr 19, 2021 6:54:31 GMT
I've just watched Bjorn's 'Breakfast' Interview on BBC iPlayer. Frustratingly, the Male Interviewer didn't ask him about how many New Songs there are. Instead, he declared that there were 5 of them, in a voice-over, during a brief clip of the 'Dancing Queen' Video. So, we are still not sure if 5 Songs is accurate, or if it was the Interviewer, repeating rumours, that he's heard. On the BBC Website, there is a 'Feature' about Today's Bjorn Interview. The Feature says, that Bjorn, has 'confirmed', that there are 5 New ABBA Songs. If he has, he did it Off Air, as he certainly didn't do so in the Televised part. The '5 New Songs' claim is under the 'A happy ending' Heading. link |
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Post by gazman on Apr 19, 2021 17:35:48 GMT
At least Björn has learned to say upfront that he can't comment on the songs/avatars LOL.
I'm now more intrigued as to how the 'big reveal' will finally come. Another Instagram/ABBASITE message, out of the blue, probably...
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Post by hejiranyc on Apr 20, 2021 15:42:17 GMT
This Abbatars project is progressing at a glacial pace. I was resolutely against paying money to see this. But the little details dropped in these recent articles are intriguing. As mentioned above, I suspect that the writer of the article may have erroneously suggested that the entire show consists of newly recorded vocals. But if this is actually the case, I am really excited to hear these new interpretations. Plus, I had assumed that the Abbatars would be based entirely on old concert footage that had somehow been rendered into 3-D holograms. But now it sounds like the Abbatars will be created from scratch, which opens a world of interesting possibilities. I am now sorta kinda interested in seeing this.
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Post by justabba on Apr 21, 2021 5:22:53 GMT
This Abbatars project is progressing at a glacial pace. I was resolutely against paying money to see this. But the little details dropped in these recent articles are intriguing. As mentioned above, I suspect that the writer of the article may have erroneously suggested that the entire show consists of newly recorded vocals. But if this is actually the case, I am really excited to hear these new interpretations. Plus, I had assumed that the Abbatars would be based entirely on old concert footage that had somehow been rendered into 3-D holograms. But now it sounds like the Abbatars will be created from scratch, which opens a world of interesting possibilities. I am now sorta kinda interested in seeing this. My understanding is the concert will be 4 body doubles, but that somehow their faces will be ABBA in 1979. No idea how that will work. This is based on the photo I've seen in rehearsal, together with the various casting calls for ABBA body doubles. |
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Post by richard on Apr 21, 2021 10:19:58 GMT
If they're going to use body doubles for the avatar show, I find the concept even less interesting. They might as well cut out all this palaver and give these new songs to an ABBA tribute band to mime to them and be done with it. But, silly me, where's the money in that for the ABBA business model?
Beatles fan that I am, I saw The Fab Four tribute band on YouTube two or three years ago, and remember thinking that these guys were at least as good, if not better, than The Beatles themselves in performing their songs - and that's live!
So I wonder how I'd feel about an ABBA tribute band MIMING to these new songs. Probably I wouldn't mind at all - provided I felt the songs were any good; because, after all, it's the songs that really matter in the end. But, of course, for now, it's all about the hoped-for money to stem from this avatar show.
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Post by abbafanie on Apr 21, 2021 10:46:26 GMT
This Abbatars project is progressing at a glacial pace. I was resolutely against paying money to see this. But the little details dropped in these recent articles are intriguing. As mentioned above, I suspect that the writer of the article may have erroneously suggested that the entire show consists of newly recorded vocals. But if this is actually the case, I am really excited to hear these new interpretations. Plus, I had assumed that the Abbatars would be based entirely on old concert footage that had somehow been rendered into 3-D holograms. But now it sounds like the Abbatars will be created from scratch, which opens a world of interesting possibilities. I am now sorta kinda interested in seeing this. My understanding is the concert will be 4 body doubles, but that somehow their faces will be ABBA in 1979. No idea how that will work. This is based on the photo I've seen in rehearsal, together with the various casting calls for ABBA body doubles. Would these casting calls be looking for body doubles of those who physically (not facially) resemble 1979 ABBA, to be motion tracked and converted to digital? That way, they'd have an 'accurate' body template which could then be combined with the actual ABBA faces to create a fully digital projection? I'm only guessing here, the idea of them somehow meshing digital ABBA faces onto live non-ABBA body doubles sounds messy. |
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Post by jj on Apr 21, 2021 12:45:18 GMT
I have a great idea! Specialist artists could create extremely accurate face-masks of each of the ABBA members for these four body stand-ins to wear over their own faces for the performances.
And then those two songs (that were recorded four years ago) can finally be released!
Hooray! Problem solved!
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Post by jj on Apr 25, 2021 11:46:56 GMT
I recently watched an online Q&A video broadcast with Carl Magnus Palme. The video dates from early January of this year, and he says that he would be extremely surprised if those new songs hadn't been released inside the next 12 months. So according to him, there's less than a year to wait.
He also thinks that, despite some fans saying they've lost enthusiasm for the music after all the delays, there should still be a huge amount of excitement as soon as they're released, and that the media will go berserk when it happens.
Personally, I now think that all will be forgiven and forgotten when this happens, and that when they finally come, the sheer joy will be immense. It will be an event of great moment and a wonderful high for all ABBA fans everywhere. And many happy tears will be shed amongst us.
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Referring to them as "new songs" will soon be a bit daft.