Pictures of Stig Anderson

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Stig. He's rarely talked about. What is the man's legacy? A genius who managed and cultivated an iconic worldwide group of superstars or a ruthless businessman who fell out with the group members over financial affairs and ended his relationship with the members in acrimony, tainting his legacy?
I don't know the details of the final years very well but it's fascinating all the same. He passed away a good while ago so maybe it's ok now to assess the mark he made during those crucial, formative years in the early seventies. What do you think?

He was a genius of the music business and without him, they never would have broken out of Sweden. ZERO chance. Period. That aspect of their career, the worldwide success, a lot of that happened because of Stig's experience and contacts, and relentless devotion to the band.

So certain? I could live with something like 'without him, they might never have broken out of Sweden', but it should be easy enough to demonstrate that they had a lot more than ZERO chance.

Are we all agreed that the ABBA couples would have come together musically whether or not Stig was involved in their management, that B & B wrote great songs whether or not Stig had a hand in them, that the girls' vocal skills were exceptional and that the four of them had sufficient drive, motivation and ambition? If the latter is the least certain, we might note that Benny and Frida were parents but made the decision to prioritise their career, while Agnetha's early determination should be self evident. Did they really need Stig to keep them working towards their dream? Forty years later, Benny has never stopped making music, while Agnetha keeps returning to it. What else would they have done during the 1970s, other than keep plugging away in the recording studio?

So the question is whether or not they would have had success beyond their national borders. Well, we know that they would have tried. Benny wrote Sunny Girl without Stig, and it was a number one in the Netherlands, while Agnetha put her home stardom at risk by decamping to Germany for a while. Nor did they need Stig to tell them that the UK/US was really where it was at; we have plenty of evidence for this.

So they would have tried, but would they have succeeded? I would argue that two events were key elements in developing and sustaining their international career: Eurovision of course, and the superb quality of SOS, which rescued them from the one hit wonder basement. Surely there's little debate about the fact that they would have had a number of Melodifestivalen attempts, whether or not Stig was on the scene. Which Swedish artist of national repute gave it a miss? Frida had a go on her own in 1969, while Agnetha submitted a song in 1968. The four of them would surely have been knocking at the Eurovision door throughout the 1970s, even if Waterloo hadn't given them their ticket in 1974.

Would they have ever won the Melodifestivalen without Stig? Well, wasn't his songwriting input mainly restricted to ideas and the odd lyric? As well as Waterloo, Ring Ring was a potential winner, and so was Hasta Manana, and so was Bang-A-Boomerang, etc. There would have been more each year throughout the decade, and it would be a wild leap in the dark to believe that they would all have been unsuccessful with Stig's compositional involvement subtracted. So I'm arguing that a Stigless ABBA could easily have won through to a Eurovision grand final with a strong song, whether in 1974 or later. Then Frida and Agnetha would have turned up, looking like they did and singing like they did. Zero chance of winning?
          
OK, so what about the SOS moment? Stig helped a little with that song, but even in the unlikely event that it was a crucial contribution without which SOS would have bombed, ABBA's singles from SOS to TACOM were so individually distinct that any one of them could have rescued their dwindling fortunes.

Finally. Finally. In the early days, did Stig really have all of the international contacts and clout that Wombat mentions? His Wiki entry is very Scandicentric. Would he have needed to put so many of ABBA's eggs in the Eurovision basket if he really did have lots of strings to pull in the UK and US? It's not as if the UK was a completely closed door to continental acts during this period. Focus and Golden Earring didn't need to win Eurovision.

To conclude. ABBA had the songwriting and vocal talent to succeed internationally, as well as the determination.They would have made repeated Eurovision attempts with or without Stig. Gorgeous girls with great voices, singing a catchy song, will always stand a chance. Further, B & B showed in the SOS-TACOM period a versatility and adventure in their songwriting that would always have maximised their chances, sooner or later, of stabilising their international career with a post-Eurovision hit.     

Discuss?