ABBA Voyage: General Discussion 2021 Sept - Dec

And worse - when they did use the single edit of Eagle on subsequent releases, it was a re-creation with a completely incorrect edit point. Just a couple of weeks ago, Steve Wright played this version. The correct one did appear on the deluxe of The Album but is otherwise quite scarce. The error one sounds so odd!

Not played the 2017 picture disc or coloured vinyl issues, but I suspect it might be the error one on those? And the downloads with it?

Too many slow, dull tracks. A move away from break-up to heavy topics. Do they need to air their parenting issues in public?

Where ABBA do try and sound uptempo they seem flat or just silly. Agnetha's voice has no joie de vivre. Too Frida dominant. It's not a long album but it just feels like it.

No, I am not talking about Voyage in 2021 but The Visitors in 1981.

I agree that "Should I Laugh Or Cry" should have been on there. But the existing version of "Like An Angel..." is just perfect for me. There are few ABBA songs with as much atmosphere as this one.

Coming back to talk of sales, I think I can see Voyage doing better than most people expected, even if there's not much more specific promotion or songs on the radio.
Why? Perhaps more than any other act, there are millions of people across the planet who have an Abba compilation (mainly Abba Gold), absolutely love it, but have no other album by the group. To them, Voyage is the natural follow-on to Gold. Even though the older albums had greater acclaim, Voyage is a very nice attractive package, people will have heard at least a couple of songs off it, and it will be an obvious thing to buy. The whole Abbatar project will obviously reinforce this, featuring as it does at least two of the new songs.

I do. Especially in recent years. It has to do with a lack of time. I hardly ever have a chance to listen to a complete studio album and I hate to have to stop halfway through. So playing a few tracks from a compilation is a solution. However I agree the sequencing is a bit strange. I always felt that Fernando and Chiquitita side by side don't work well and then you have that disco sequence of Does Your Mother Know, Voulez-Vous and Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! which is a bit too much too.

If you look at a spectrum read out of the Voyage album there is a lot of midrange activity - possibly caused by having orchestra on some tracks ? Previous ABBA releases seem to have a lot more high midrange and treble in the vocal parts and less 'mush' going on in the midrange. Although that 'mush' seems a result of mp3 compression, or at least the version I got off Amazon. The high res version was great allowing the detail of the orchestral parts to shine.
I don't have a problem with any of the singing, it was far better than I expected. Different maybe, but still great and way better than any number of singers in the charts. I much prefer Voyage to Super Trooper, and they did an incredible job. They should be very proud of themselves - I know of no other artists who could pull this off at their age.

Saw this on Facebook and couldn't resist sharing

Adkins is a promising young singer-songwriter.

Mark my words, she'll go far!

Thought Of the Day......

Are you over all the hype ?

Some of us have waited for 40 years or more for more music and now that its happened, is it like Christmas .. an anti Climax ?

Is the re-runs on TV the constant playing of Voyage etc all a bit to much now ?

I'm playing Devils advocate, but I guess there a few out there who will be glad that its over.... or are there ?

I was nervous about the album's release - it was a bit like a 'life event'. I am now relieved that I like (love) the album, that it has been generally well-received, and that it has made No 1 in the UK and many other countries around the world. I have confidence that it will continue to be a success, up to Christmas anyway. I actually haven't played the album that much - probably less than the average fan and not as much as I would have with the previous albums in the 70s and 80s. These days, I like to almost ration my exposure to a new album, so that it continues to sound fresh.

I confess that I have some buyer's remorse about purchasing so many editions of the album. I also have great reservations about the way the album was marketed with the multiple editions, both in terms of 'milking the fans' and from an environmental perspective. However, they did get a lot of things right - I believe the single releases were about right, especially releasing those first two singles together, although I have reservations about LT as a single as well as an album track.

In general, I am still in a state of enjoyment rather than anti-climax.

I'm with those who prefer Voyage to the Super Trouper album, but not as much as Voulez-Vous and The Visitors albums. But my opinions of the tracks on Voyage are not anywhere near 'fixed' at the moment - that will take a bit of time.
One thing that occurs to me, however, as it has before occasionally: how reluctant Benny (I'm assuming it's mostly down to him) seems to be to adopt a more pared-down approach to some songs. In a previous post, I said that I felt that Bumblebees would have benefited that way. I still think this. 
But it remains an incredible and wonderful thing to me that this Voyage album has actually happened after 40 years.

Until November 5, The Visitors was my all-time favourite ABBA album. Right now, I don't see Voyage usurping that title. However, I'm not sure I would have declared The Visitors my favourite after just three weeks. Some of the tracks took more time to really get under my skin.

As for buyer's remorse, I really only regret buying the ABBAtars picture disc. It's very underwhelming.

It's far too early for me to rank Voyage in regard to AꓭBA's other studio albums. I'm one of those fans whose favourites can alter over time. I see merit in all the albums. Could anything best Arrival? But then The Album came along which was magnificent. It's almost impossible to choose. I do love AꓭBA's darker period with songs such as TDBYC and The Visitors but then few songs thrill me as much as When I Kissed The Teacher. You see? Impossible.

I don't know which of you will be interested in this kind of dissection but I was blown away by what I heard. My old ears struggle to pick up a lot of sounds these days so this was an eye, or rather an ear- opener! He's done a couple of others, too.

I stumbled upon that video earlier: it's fascinating. The synths really hark back to Elaine and so does the energy. Agnetha's harmonies here are great. At the risk of becoming a broken record on the matter, this shows that the vocals really could have been mixed a bit better. This song is still my go-to on the album. I'd love it to be a single, but I can't see it happening now.

Edit: Ha, madonnabba, great minds think alike. (I've been helping my son with his homework while doing this and got distracted )