ABBA Voyage: General Discussion 2022 May - Aug

thank you!!

Yes, I agree. Agnetha could at the very least make herself available for the opening night - and maybe just ONE interview.


The Concert is a big risk. Let's hope the band has plenty of time to rehearse with the Abbatars in the venue before opening night.

I was looking at ticket availability and it's only first 3 months that are pretty much sold out. Plenty of tickets from September onwards.

Let's hope media interviews and positive reviews help.

I reckon a lot of people are waiting for the reviews and to know what to expect.

Not long to go now to see what it's all about and what songs are in.

I do too, much better than the 1979 tour outfits. Especially Frida looks amazing in that costume. One thing that strikes me is that they always said the look of the ABBATars would be based on how they looked in 1979, but this looks more like 1977. Maybe they changed their minds. If so, I'm all for it because I think they looked their absolute best in 1977. Agnetha and Frida were both simply stunning in ABBA The Movie.

I like the new layout. Good job, Alan. It's like a spring clean, a spruce-up. I daresay in the coming weeks there might be a flurry of activity with Voyage pending. It struck me recently how long this place has been going- quite an achievement when you think about it. There are so many other options and I indulge a little but I'll always prefer an actual forum.

Incidentally, I noticed Mike's absence. I know he'd always wanted to moderate an ABBA site. I do hope he's happy and well, whatever he's doing.

Well, Facebook is by its very nature “all about me”. I agree though, gamleman. Some will put their own personal choices in there regardless of whether anyone else will be interested. With my dream setlist, I limited my personal choices to two.

It’s always been a case of how ABBA would be now if they were that young. It’s a reinvention. I’m not sure about those new outfits though. And as I say, I think the fact that they haven’t got ABBA quite right (Björn and Agnetha especially) might distract me somewhat.

It would appear (from everything we’ve seen so far) that the ABBA Tars won’t be changing hairstyles. They appear to be fixed in their 1977 looks (I think I’ll scream if any media still tries to tell us it’s actually 1979!). I doubt they’ll use any actual costumes from the time, but I’d love to see them in one of their 1977 tour outfits.

On that last point, that's exactly why I haven't tried to make one of my own. I know mostly which songs I'd want but no way would I know what order to put them in beyond having a big number like Dancing Queen as the finale!

I'm going into the show with an open mind, though I'm not booked to go until August so by then there'll be plenty of reviews. Though I plan to mostly ignore them like I did with the album reviews, half of which seemed annoyed that Voyage wasn't as strong an album as ABBA Gold, ignoring just what a high bar that is...

I wouldn't call it stupid so much as a sign of just how dominating ABBA Gold is in the public consciousness. Between that and Mamma Mia! means there are twenty or so songs that everyone knows, then everything else gets largely ignored (though Mamma Mia 2 features several lesser known tracks which I liked). Heck, ABBA Gold is still in the top 20 albums charts right this second, weeks after Voyage stopped charting. An album that's existed longer than I have and surely everyone who wants it must have bought three times over by now.

Back on topic, there are one or two reviews where they're explicit about comparing it to Gold e.g. in the Telegraph they rated it 3 stars, with the tagline 'Abba's new album contains nothing to match their greatest hits'. With other reviews they don't say it outright but they do carry an undertone of 'it doesn't quite measure up to their most well known songs', which is a bar almost no album could hit, including most of ABBA's own studio albums!

Though for the record, I actually think that Don't Shut Me Down and I Still Have Faith In You are good enough to stand up to the Gold tracks. At first I thought a re release of Gold with those two tracks added was an obvious money spinner, but then I realised that CDs can't hold that much audio!

Absolutely NO to stripping the bridge in Gimme! Gimme! Gimme (A Man After Midnight)! It's as essential to the song as the guitar solo in Eagle. Agnetha and Frida's voices are like sirens luring the listener in and that baseline is divine.  I'm really against stripping songs of anything that was originally placed there. Same with The Name of the Game.  It's so annoying when people post abridged versions of ABBA songs.

It won't happen anyway. 

Smooth Radio. 12 Abba songs made it Dancing Queen highest at number 10. Neither DSMD or ISHFIY made the list. TDBYC did. Surprised S.O.S, LAYLOM, TACOM did not make it yet TYFTM and IHAD did.

No 'The Name Of The Game' on the list

The biggest surprise for me was The Day Before You Came. It didn't make waves when first released but for some reason in the last decade or so people have really taken to it and rate it highly.

I've noticed as well that I Have A Dream really isn't popular amongst many fans which is weird to me as I've always adored it. Since Voyage came along I've taken to considering Ode to Freedom a 'sequel' of sorts to that song

On sept 2nd 2021 I had my 22 songs in my head so it will be good to see if any of then will be on the set list. As for the new clothes it looks very 74/75 I am so looking forward to the show and I am counting down the days I have planes a three day visit around London.

A few years ago when I compiled my ABBA Top 20, TDBYC was at No 2 after SOS at No 1. TNOTG was at No 3. This was an odd result for me as TDBYC does not really feature the ABBA sound but it does make up for that in other ways. The same can be said of LAAPTMR which I also hold in very high regard and was in my Top 20.

Much as I love The Day Before You Came, there's one part of the lyrics I never quite wrapped my head around. The beginning makes clear that it takes her around 1 hour 15 minutes from leaving her house to being at her desk (leaves at 8, gets there 9:15). And she leaves at 5pm and gets the train back home, which you'd assume would take a similar amount of time. But it then jumps to 'I must have opened my front door at 8 o'clock or so'... which leaves nearly two hours unaccounted for.

Even factoring in that she stopped on the way back for some Chinese takeaway (apparently Agnetha herself liked Chinese food a lot), I don't see how this would take up so much time. Was there a major train delay or other issue that delayed her commute home by an hour? Did she run an errand or two before getting dinner? Everything else about this song is so detailed the fact that there's this gap bugs me.

And yes, before you ask I have spent far too long thinking about this...