This edition also contains new sleeve notes and is digitally remastered in 24 bit from the original multitracks.

Since 1992, it has been re-released several times, most notably in 1999 as the first remastered reissue to mark the group's 25th anniversary of winning the Eurovision Song Contest 1974, in 2008 to coincide with the release of the film Mamma Mia! Then it was the gay community who underpinned the comeback… we felt that we had the full support, and it made a lot of difference. The formats for the September anniversary editions are a brand new 2LP picture disc on heavyweight vinyl, housed in die-cut gatefold sleeve; an equally new gold cassette edition, with a black cassette also available; and a previously available 2LP version, featuring two x gold, 180 g vinyl discs. Take it from no less an authority than Max Martin: “I’m a sucker for the melancholy,” admitted the legendary pop producer in a 2001 interview with TIME Europe.The retrospective has played a flagship role in bringing ABBA’s music to new audiences globally, as it continues to be shared among their immense global following of original fans. It capitalized on a simmering, subcultural interest in ABBA’s work and sparked a full-blown revival, one that culminated in Meryl Streep and Pierce Brosnan belting and grunting their way through “S. million copies and is the nineteenth biggest-selling greatest-hits album in the Nielsen Music era (which began in 1991).

The track listing was similar to the original album, with some added content: a 25-minute documentary produced in 1999, and the 1992 video of "Dancing Queen". Over time, those greatest hits albums—purchased as a package, repeated incessantly on the radio—formalized each act’s conventionally-accepted canon and, in turn, cemented their enduring public personas. By the time ABBA won the 1974 Eurovision contest with “Waterloo,” Andersson and Ulvaeus had each enjoyed a decade of domestic success as musicians, and Faltskog and Lyngstad were working solo artists in their own right. They had collectively played thousands of tour dates across Sweden, produced music for dozens of other artists, and spent untold hours working as a songwriting and performing team. Ulvaeus and Andersson grew up on traditional Swedish folk music and schlager music, a sappy, simple strain of pop with a distinctly continental European flair.Its two constituent couples—Björn Ulvaeus and Agnetha Faltskog, and Benny Andersson and Frida Lyngstad—were either separated or divorced by the release of their final album, The Visitors, in 1981.

Despite the the heavy vinyl quality and quite replay experience, this remaster sounds flat and lifeless. It was released in Europe and New Zealand (with the European track list, and not the previous Australasian track list). For gay men around the world, ABBA’s blend of naïve camp—consider the outfits they wore on stage, which ran the gamut from High Elven couture to sets of matching white silk kimonos—indelible melodies, and genuinely wrenching melodrama proved captivating. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our User Agreement and Privacy Policy and Cookie Statement and Your California Privacy Rights. And while all four members continued working together with an impressive level of professionalism, the fact remained that Ulvaeus and Andersson were writing music and lyrics, including post-breakup ballads and wounded domestic dramas, for their ex-wives to sing.

Also, the inner sleeve still feature the liner notes by Tobler when a more accurate text has been put together by C. The set includes such undying classics as “Dancing Queen,” “Knowing Me, Knowing You,” “Take A Chance On Me,” “Mamma Mia,” and “The Winner Takes It All. Andersson and Ulvaeus collaborated with Tim Rice on Chess, a musical about a chess tournament (and love triangle) set against the backdrop of the Cold War; Lyngstad made an album with Phil Collins; Faltskog scored a few solo hits and duets before largely retreating from public life. The full catalogs of almost every artist popular enough to merit such a collection are available through any streaming service, organized by algorithms, and easily sorted by play count, which means labels have little reason to waste time and energy on a task the machines have already mastered. A Man After Midnight)” are marked by quiet urgency: “Half-past 12/And I’m watchin’ the late show in my flat all alone/How I hate to spend the evening on my own,” Faltskog moans.