ABBA’s Top 10 Hits
Anni-Frid “Frida” Lyngstad, Bjorn Ulvaeus, Benny Anderson and Agnetha Faltskog made up the Swedish pop quartet that formed in Stockholm in 1972. ABBA got its name from an acronym using the first initial of each of their names. However, Abba was the name of a Swedish fish canning company. The group negotiated with the cannery for the right to use their name.
Benny started out in a Swedish pop group called The “Hep Stars” in 1964. They were also known as the “Swedish Beatles”.
Bjorn, at the age of 18, worked with a Swedish folk bowling group called the “Hootenanny Singers”.
Agnetha was a singer-songwriter, and at the age of seventeen, she scored her first number one single in Sweden. She released four solo albums between 1968 and 1971. While filming a Swedish television special, she met Bjorn. They got married in 1971.
Frida, the final link in the group, sang in various dance bands, since she was thirteen years old. In 1969 she met Benny during a concert tour in southern Sweden. She produced her first album in 1971.
Before becoming ABBA, the two couples vacationed in Cyprus in 1970 and sang for fun on the beach. Just like they heard, they launched a stage act called Festfolk, but received disappointing reviews.
They sang together again in 1971 and in 1972, although the songs were labeled “Bjorn and Benny”, the women sang in the background. Stig Anderson, no relation to Benny, became his manager in 1971 and helped orchestrate the group’s popularity.
In 1973, a Swedish newspaper held a contest to find a name for the group. Some names considered were “Alibaba”, “FABB” and “Baba”. But eventually all the entries were discarded and Stig Anderson, who had been calling the group ABBA, was the name they chose.
In 1974, they had their first international hit with “Waterloo.”
On the US charts, ABBA had fourteen Top 40 hits, one of which went to number one, according to Billboard’s Top 40 charts. Here are ABBA’s 10 biggest hits:
1. Dancing Queen – 1977 – The group’s only number one single was originally titled “Boogaloo.” From the album “Arrival”, it has been called ABBA’s signature song and has been covered by many artists.
2. Take A Chance On Me – 1978 – Bjorn’s hobby was running and while running, he sang a stylish beat to himself that became “take a chance on me”. The song was originally called “Billy Boy”.
3. Waterloo – 1974 – ABBA’s first US Top 10 hit was a number one hit in many countries. The song won the 1974 Eurovision Song Contest. The song, about a girl who surrenders to romance, as Napoleon surrendered to Waterloo, was originally called “Honey Pie”.
4. The Winner Takes It All – 1980 – Benny denies that the song, while about the divorce, is not about his divorce from Agnetha. His last Top 10 single was never performed live by ABBA for an audience.
5. The Name of the Game – 1978 – Released on his album titled “ABBA: The Album”. It was also included in a 1977 film titled “ABBA: The Movie”.
6. Fernando – 1976 – Originally recorded as a solo by Frida, in Swedish, it went through several name changes, including “Tango” and “Hernandez,” before the limo driver suggested “Fernando.” It was then that an English version of the song was recorded. It is ABBA’s best-selling single of all time.
7. Knowing Me, Knowing You – 1977 – Also from the album “Arrival”, the song is about breakups, as are many of their songs. This song also went through several title changes, including “Ring It In” and “Number 1, Number 1”.
8. SOS – 1975 – Agnetha recorded this song in Swedish on her 1975 solo album, but the group recorded an English version for their self-titled album. To date, it is the only single in which the title and the credited act are palindromes.
9. I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do – 1976 – Influenced by Billy Vaughn’s saxophone songs, this song was featured in the movie “Muriel’s Wedding”.
10. Does your mother know? – 1979 – Most of ABBA’s songs featured Frida, Agnetha, or both as leads. This one features Bjorn as the lead and is about a man who responds to the flirtation of a much younger girl. From the album “Do You Want”.
In 1978, Benny and Frida got married, but divorced three years later. Bjorn and Agnetha divorced in 1979. The group broke up in 1982.
Frida recorded solo and had a US Top 20 hit “I Know Something’s Going On” in 1983. It was produced by Phil Collins.
Bjorn and Benny continued to write successfully.
Agnetha also had a solo career and hit the Top 30 in the US with “Can’t Shake Loose”.
Although ABBA disbanded more than 30 years ago, their music has been kept alive with greatest hits albums, tribute groups, and with the musical “Mama Mia,” which brought the group together for the first time since 1986, in 2005 for the premiere in Stockholm. Since then, the musical has been an international success and spawned a 2008 film, “Mama Mia! The Movie,” starring Meryl Streep, Pierce Brosnan, Colin Firth and Amanda Seyfried.
ABBA was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2010.