Mama Mia! The Swedish Group ABBA Has Made a Lot of Money, Money Money!

Much has been written about the Swedish super group called ABBA. After all, the group has more than proven its endurance to a global audience.

The group's iconic logo was/is also a registered trademark

Songwriters and musicians Björn Ulaeus and Benny Andersson first met in 1966, and in 1969, the seeds of the soon-to-be Swedish supergroup were planted when Björn met his fiancée, Agnetha Fältskog, and Benny met his fiancée, Anni-Frid (known as Frida) Lyngstad, and the group formed in Stockholm in 1972. Ulvaeus and Andersson knew how to write contagious pop hits, but Fältskog's and Lyngstad's beautiful harmonies were integral to the global chart-topping ABBA sound. The group's name is an acronym from the first letter in each of their names. In 1974, ABBA was the contestant for Sweden in the Eurovision Song Contest, the pan-European music festival. Sweden (and ABBA) took home the prize as the winner of the Eurovision contest that year with their performance of the song "Waterloo".

Although relatively unknown outside of Scandinavia at the time, ABBA used the Eurovision song contest as a launching pad to become a global pop music sensation. While Sweden has long been one of the world's largest cultural exporters (books, music, film, television programming, etc.), likely because in Swedish public schools, the population is taught English in as a core subject (along with Swedish and mathematics) staring in grade school between the ages 7 and 9, depending on the school attended. Indeed, most Scandinavians are praised for having both fluency in English and language competency in addition to their own native tongues, hence Swedes successfully export to the broader English-speaking world.

Anyway, in 1974, in spite of competing against the likes of Olivia Newton-John who represented the UK in Eurovision that year (unfortunately, she sang a boring song entitled "Long Live Love" that year, and her outfit was similarly conservative), ABBA grabbed the top prize.  A video of the group's winning performance in the 1974 Eurovision contest can be seen below, or by visiting HERE.



Not only was the ABBA song "Waterloo" understood across Europe, but the band also wore what were considered pretty daring costumes that year, too. Their costumes were certainly eye-catching: shiny, satin, all-in-one outfits and even shinier knee-length hot-boots. The costumes were explained largely as a way to exploit a Swedish tax law. As long as their outfits were so outrageous that they could not be worn on the street, the band could claim the cost of the outfits were tax-deductible.

ABBA band member Björn Ulvaeus recalled: "In my honest opinion, we looked like nuts in those years. Nobody can have been as badly dressed on stage as we were." Björn added: "We figured with our clothes, people would remember us even if we finished ninth." Frida noted: "We chose clothes we felt comfortable in. My favorite was a body stocking with a little dress cut diagonally. I thought I was elegant and sexy in it."

But the costumes fit right into the disco era which was just emerging around the world at the time, and people remembered the band who wore such colorful (if garish) outfits. It didn't hurt that their music was universal, and the harmonies of the women's voices in the group sounded great. They took their knack for memorable (if ugly) costumes, along with catchy lyrics and dancible pop melodies and became a global superstar group whose success is in many ways, unparalleled. All told, ABBA released eight studio albums over their original 10 years together. Perhaps their most iconic single was their 1976 hit "Dancing Queen" which can be listened to below, or by visiting https://archive.org/details/ABBADancingQueen_201811.

"Dancing Queen" was ABBA's biggest hit in the United States (going to number one), and it also topped the charts in Australia, the Netherlands, Belgium, Ireland, Mexico, New Zealand, Norway, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, the UK, Germany and Zimbabwe. "Dancing Queen" also reached the top five in many other countries.

At their commercial zenith in the late 1970's, ABBA were reputedly second only to Volvo in their contribution to Sweden's exports. While figures vary, industry watchers agree that ABBA has sold at least 200 million albums and singles worldwide (some unconfirmed estimates put the figure closer to 400 million, behind only The Beatles but ahead of Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd and Queen), and certainly comparable to the Rolling Stones. Collectively, estimates are that ABBA has earned more than $2 billion in album and singles sales during its career.

The 1974 Eurovision-winning band was actually made up of two couples — Agnetha Fältskog and  Björn Ulvaeus, and Benny Andersson and Anni-Frid (Frida) Lyngstad. Both couples would later split as the band became most successful, and ABBA broke up as a group in 1982. ABBA was always bigger in terms of studio recordings, but decidedly less so when it came to touring and live performances. Despite some disagreements among the quartet, the four largely remained in touch and they seem fairly united in decision-making that has perpetuated their fame and fortune. The original ABBA team have proven themselves VERY adept at continuing the nurture their money-machine by carefully licensing their songs to bands and singers who have kept their songs continually playing (and selling).

For example, in 1992, they wisely licensed several of their songs to the UK pop duo Erasure (Vince Clarke and Andy Bell) which released an EP of four of ABBA's best-known hits. That EP revived ABBA's songs for a generation of young adults who grew up listening to the original ABBA songs on the radio, and was also Erasure's first and only #1 on the UK Singles Chart for the single "Take A Chance on Me", plus it got significant airplay in the U.S., Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

ABBA later licensed its songs to live theater productions of the show "Mama Mia" which opened in London and remained a best-seller there, replicating that successful run in New York, Toronto, Sydney and elsewhere. The stage version's worldwide gross from 49 productions exceeded $2 billion in 2015, having been seen by 500 million people. The 14-year Broadway run alone grossed more than $600 million, according to the trade group Broadway League.

In 2014, the ABBA band-members released a video they called "The Last Video" which can be seen below, or by visiting https://youtu.be/8L6T6Yj5u4k which is indicative of the continued creative work from the group members.

ABBA's West-End/Broadway success with "Mama Mia", in-turn, lead to the Hollywood movie version of "Mama Mia" that starred Meryl Streep. The "Mamma Mia" movie version of the all-ABBA musical was released by Universal and earned the band another $600 million at the box office, while the sequel (whose story was panned) still quietly earned another $280 million during just its first four weeks without even factoring in DVD and streaming sales, licensing to cable television, etc. ABBA also released (or was it really a re-release of their biggest hits?) "ABBA Gold: Greatest Hits", which has been called one of the most influential compilation albums ever released, and sparked a strong revival of ABBA's music that has endured well into the 21st century.

In 2018, one guest-star of "Mama Mia 2", herself a seventies pop icon Cher, released a whole new album of ABBA covers following her appearance in the sequel movie. She announced one of the singles "Gimme! Gimme! Gimme!" via her active Twitter account.

🎂time pic.twitter.com/222E1D3m2B

— Cher (@cher) August 8, 2018

Cher told the press (see HERE): "I've always liked ABBA and saw the original Mamma Mia musical on Broadway three times. After filming "Mamma Mia! 2: Here We Go Again", I was reminded again of what great and timeless songs they wrote and started thinking 'why not do an album of their music?' The songs were harder to sing than I imagined but I'm so happy with how the music came out. I'm really excited for people to hear it. It's a perfect time."

Meanwhile, back in Stockholm, Sweden, the ABBA The Museum is a Swedish interactive exhibition about the pop band ABBA that opened in Stockholm, Sweden in May 2013. ABBA's collected works are showcased in a contemporary, interactive setting at Djurgården, Stockholm.

ABBA also announced that the Swedish foursome had recorded several brand new songs during 2018, its first in 35 years, which will be released in early 2019. The original band members are all now in their seventies, so studio recordings are one thing, but the group has said they have no intention of doing any live performances. But there ARE plans for a TV special, and a separate digital project to recreate the four members performing as what they're branding their 'ABBAtars' using the experience gained from the ABBA Museum to further their commercial success on a global basis.

Just how much longer ABBA can perpetuate its "Money, Money, Money" tree remains to be seen. But they've proven themselves perhaps the most successful at merchandising their music in a way that few other bands have yet to replicate -- it doesn't just happen, it takes a degree of talent, intellect and work -- but perhaps could pave the way for future artists in the 21st century?

Strange Archives: Attention K-Mart Shoppers

The internet has a collection of the truly obscure! The website Plaid Stallions, with a heavy focus on toys from the 1970's, featured a 1978 newspaper flyer for K-Mart including ads for toys of that era. However, because its the holiday season, memories of shopping at cheesy, American discount stores like K-Mart is also no doubt something for which many people are familiar.

Notably, the Internet Archive is assembling a massive digital collection of miscellaneous things, some quite impressive, such as the emulator library of video games and home video game consoles as well as handheld devices which I've addressed in prior posts, including one about Speak & Spell and other items, for example. There are also video clips from different sources, and a large audio collection. Due to copyright issues, audio can be more challenging, but sometimes the work is already done by others, in this case the once-giant discount retailer K-Mart Corporation.

Shoppers of K-Mart may recall the retailer's in-store audio background music which was periodically interrupted by K-Mart product commercials which were usually introduced with the phrase "Attention K-Mart Shoppers".  A collection entitled "Attention K-Mart Shoppers" is one such collection. It even contains special audio advertisements announcing the addition of a new K-Mart pharmacy from 1974 where shoppers could fill their prescriptions.

As the archivist Mark Davis admits, this is a somewhat strange collection. In the late 1980's and early 1990's, he worked for K-Mart behind the service desk and the store played specific pre-recorded cassettes issued by corporate (before that, they were reel-to-reel tapes sent to each store location every month to keep the background music fresh). This was background music, or perhaps you could call it elevator music. Some have some recordings of musicians including the likes of Neil Diamond, for example. He saved the tapes from the trash during this period, and its built from his extensive, if odd collection, although others have since supplemented his recordings. One of these recordings date back to December 1974, evidenced by the continuous loop of Christmas music that was featured. Separately, there was also a Muzak Christmas music tape from another collection which was quite similar, except its missing the regular K-mart ads throughout. Another 1973 recording featured the company's advertising jingle used at the time about K-Mart being "your savings store". There are even some in the collection that came from vinyl recordings when the company still went by the name S.S. Kresge which date back to the 1960's. An October 1989 recording is possibly the type most people who shopped at K-Mart back in the day will remember. Most recordings are differentiated mainly by the introductory spot introducing the retailer to shoppers, as if the big red "K" and the aqua-blue "mart" wasn't enough of a tip for them to know exactly where they were.

Until around 1992, the cassettes were rotated monthly. Then, they were replaced weekly. Finally sometime around 1993, satellite programming was introduced which eliminated the need for these tapes altogether. The older tapes contain canned elevator music with instrumental renditions of songs. Then, the songs became completely mainstream around 1991. All of them have advertisements every few songs.

He notes that the monthly tapes were very, very, worn and rippled at the time they were converted to MP3 files. He says that's because they ran for 14 hours a day, 7 days a week on auto-reverse. If you do the math, assuming that each tape is 30 minutes per side, that's over 800 passes over a tape head each month.

Still, for anyone interested in this peculiar collection of background music that played in K-Mart stores during that era, this collection might be worth listening to.

Visit the full "Attention K-Mart Shoppers" collection at https://archive.org/details/attentionkmartshoppers for this rather unusual collection.

For a sample of what's contained in this collection (this one from 1973), listen to the embedded post below, or visit https://archive.org/details/Kmart1973ReelToReel for the recording.