Crazy ABBA Facts, Members, Songs, Albums For The Pop Lovers

ABBA was a Swedish Europop group that was among the most successful in the history of pop music and culture.

There are four ABBA members, Benny Andersson, Bjorn Ulvaeus, Agnetha Faltskog, and Anni-Frid Lyngstad.

The group first started getting recognized when Björn and Benny met Lyngstad and Faltskog. The name of the group has been derived from the first letters of each member's name.

ABBA is known to be one of the best-selling musicians of all time. It has successfully made a record sale of about 150 million and 385 million units worldwide. On November 3, 2012, ABBA ranked 3rd best-selling singles artist in the United Kingdom with a complete total of 11.3 million singles sold. 

The band is well known for being the first group from a non-English background to achieve such enormous success. It had eight albums that were recorded consecutively in the U.S.

If you liked reading these ABBA facts, do also check out our other facts articles on Barack Obama facts and Albert Einstein facts.

ABBA Songs

It all started when Benny and Bjorn were rocking around in Sweden together. In the year 1970, the two of them teamed up to record songs for an album called Lycka. The women sang as backup singers for this album, and they came together as a band to sing their first song, called Hej, Gamle man (Hello, Old man)

In the year 1976, the group took part in one of the most important promotional campaigns in the USA, which put 'Take a Chance on me' as one of the top three singles.

By the end of 1975, the band released its greatest hits, scored a handful of hits from its first few records, such as 'Summer Night City', and started receiving U.S. recognition.

The single 'Gimme! Gimme! Gimme!' was released in the year 1979, and it coincided with their tour of Canada, the USA, and Europe.

ABBA rose to popularity after they won the Eurovision Song Contest in 1974 and came to be known as the Swedish Beatles. At this point, they had already made a few ABBA hits like 'Dancing Queen', 'SOS', 'Mamma Mia', and 'Waterloo'. These songs are regarded as ABBA gold, of which 'Mamma Mia' was considered to be their signature song.

In March 1980, ABBA took a tour to Japan, which turned out to be the last live opening concert in front of an audience. 'Winter Takes it All' of the album' Super Trouper' took up the rest of the year.

After Benny and Frida's announcement of their divorce, ABBA released their eighth album, 'The Visitors', with the song 'One of Us' as its biggest hit single.

Even though ABBA broke up in the year 1982, the Swedish group was already world-famous, and the songs of the pop group were still in full swing. Their music appeared in movies like 'The Adventures of Priscilla', 'Queen of the Desert', and 'Muriel's Wedding'. It also appeared in the hit musical based on ABBA's music called 'Mamma Mia'.

In the year 2010, the band members were inducted into the one and only Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and their superhit song 'Dancing Queen' was inducted into the Recording Academy's Grammy Hall of Fame in 2015.

ABBA Members

The four members of this popular band are Benny Andersson, Bjorn Ulvaeus, Agnetha Faltskog, and Annie-Frid Lyngstad. Bjorn Ulvaeus and Agnetha Faltskog are married, and Anni-Frid and Benny are also married.

Each of the four members of the band had individual music careers before the formation of the band. In the year 1966, Benny and Bjorn met up and decided to write songs together.

In the year 1969, Bjorn met Agnetha and Benny met Annie-Frid. The four friends decided to work together on writing and singing new songs. Their music slowly climbed the Swedish charts, and their first hit song, 'Hej, Gamle man', took off like a storm and also made the list of the first studio album.

Their first major tour came soon after their engagement and marriage, where the song 'Ring Ring' was sung on their tours of Europe and Africa.

Finally, in the year 1973, the group came to be recognized as ABBA, a name formed from the first letter of their names. Stig Anderson, their manager, was the one to suggest this.

In 1974, ABBA was given the opportunity to perform at the Eurovision Song Concert with 'Waterloo'. Here, they won and soon had global success. The famous 'Dancing Queen'" was ABBA's music breakthrough and is regarded as one of the greatest pop songs ever written. It was around this time that 'ABBA the movie' was released.

Throughout the latter half of the 1970s, ABBA decided to concert tour Europe, the United States, Japan, and Australia. It was at this time that the ABBA album was at its peak. The ladies each performed as solo singers. As they were both solo singers, they performed songs from their newer albums and the previous albums.

However, in the year 1979, ABBA had a major split as the hep stars had started to break apart. Agnetha and Bjorn divorced, and so did Frida and Benny in early 1981.

The songs that ABBA played at this time grew sadder, and much more mature songs were recorded. In 1983, ABBA broke up permanently, and the members began to continue their careers independently, as they did before the formation of ABBA.

In the year 2005, the four members of ABBA appeared at the Stockholm premiere of the musical Mamma Mia. The second time they met was on July 4 at the Swedish premiere of the film Mamma Mia.

It was quite a happy reunion. On April 27, 2018, ABBA announced that another two more songs were to be added to the 'ABBA: The Album' and that the songs were being recorded.

Despite being worldwide popular, ABBA could not make it to the major chart success at that time. ABBA: The Album only made it to number 14, and the band's eight studio albums didn't even manage to crack the top 20s.

Thankfully, the band's hit movie 'Mamma Mia' took them to number one on the Billboard, giving ABBA the first chart-topping album in America that it truly deserved.

Abba Reunion

ABBA released its first new music in nearly four decades, along with a concert performance in which people watched the four performers go entirely digital. Next, the forthcoming album called the 'Voyage' was released on November 5, 2021, which is a follow-up to 'The Visitors' of 1981.

The show took off with the making of the album, and most probably ABBA's last album, which features the new songs 'I still have Faith in You' and 'Don't Shut me Down'. The group recorded and played together for hours every day for several weeks before they came out to the world again.

Did You Know...

ABBA had to negotiate rights to the name 'ABBA', which apparently belonged to a well-known seafood company. The ABBA Food Company was a well-known canned herring giant that was popular in the 19th century.

So, in order to keep up with the negotiations, they decided to mirror the first 'B' on the ABBA, making this their signature logo that we are all familiar with today.

'ABBA: The Movie' was then directed by Lasse Hallstrom. It was he who also made most of the band's promotional clips. He was later nominated twice for the Academy Awards for best director for 'My life as a Dog' and 'The Cider House Rules'.

Björn Ulvaeus was previously part of a Swedish band called the Hootenanny Singers.

Annie- Frid Lyngstad is the richest of the hep stars.

Surprisingly, Led Zeppelin recorded the album 'Through The Out Door' in ABBA's studio after a fun night outing with members of the band.

Fältskog, Andersson, and Lyngstad were the ones behind the backing vocals for every early song (ABBA).

In 1977, on the London tour, tickets for the two shows at the Royal Albert Hall were only available by mail application. Nearly three billion people had sent in the request to the box office to see ABBA's performance.

ABBA apparently exploited a Swedish law that said that clothes could be tax deductible if their wearers could prove that they were not used for daily wear.

There is a rumor that ABBA was paid in oil commodities from Russia. Since they could not accept rubles, the band had apparently received payment from the Soviet Union in oil commodities.

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