Abba

2022 - 5 - 27

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Image courtesy of "iNews"

Abba Voyage, review: This sublime, flawless, ridiculous concert was ... (iNews)

The last time Agnetha Falkstog, Björn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson and Anni-Frid Lyngstad played a live show in London, it was 1979. For decades it did not seem ...

It is pure “grab your friends, sing into their faces, shimmy in the aisles” joy and for three minutes it feels like everything in the world is going right. The best three minutes of my own life come towards the end of the show when that familiar glissando signals the beginning of “Dancing Queen”, a song that I have never not known. It is a relief when the avatars themselves acknowledge the strangeness of their existence. Like the mosquito preserved in amber, the “Abbatars” both are and are not of this time; four people captured in a lost youth and transposed to a new millennium. Some of the avatars’ shortfalls are made up for, too, by the lightshow – this is a spectacle that would be worth experiencing even without the band there. There’s no denying that it is absolutely brilliant to be in a room full of people with Abba songs on very loud.

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Image courtesy of "Coast Reporter"

Stars and royalty watch ABBA's return in digital stage show (Coast Reporter)

LONDON (AP) — “ABBA Voyage” is certainly a trip. Four decades after the Swedish pop supergroup last performed live, audiences can once again see ABBA ...

Producers bill the show as “revolutionary.” Time will tell. “That’s the fantastic thing.” "But now we are taking revenge.” They were in the audience, though. It's a fusion of tribute act and 3D concert movie that transcends that description. LONDON (AP) — “ABBA Voyage” is certainly a trip.

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Image courtesy of "Financial Times"

Abba Voyage review — Swedish legends take a chance on ... (Financial Times)

Lifelike 'Abbatars' take showbiz illusionism to new heights with virtual concert in London.

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Image courtesy of "Africanews English"

ABBA return to the stage as digital versions of themselves | Africanews (Africanews English)

The iconic Swedish pop stars attended the premiere of the show on Thursday (26MAY2022) night at the specially made ABBA Arena on Pudding Mill Lane in London.

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Image courtesy of "The Guardian"

Share your views on the Abba Voyage shows (The Guardian)

We would like to hear your thoughts about Abba's new concerts in which the band performs via digital avatars.

You can get in touch by filling in the form below. How do you feel about the return of the band? “By the time the show hits its finale with Thank You for the Music followed by Dancing Queen, any lingering sense that you’re not actually in the presence of Abba has dissolved.”

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Image courtesy of "The Independent"

Abba Voyage: Band make first public appearance together in 14 ... (The Independent)

'I dreamed of this for years,' singer Lyngstad said.

Start your Independent Premium subscription today. “I dreamed of this for years,” Lyngstad told the BBC on the red carpet. By clicking ‘Register’ you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use, Cookie policy and Privacy notice.

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Image courtesy of "The Independent"

ABBA Voyage review: Camp, fun and low-energy… and not just ... (The Independent)

There's a band of 10, a 20-song setlist, and strobes, beads, and domes of light submerge the crowd. It's an incredible spectacle. Everything has clearly been ...

It’s a haven for endorphins, a safe space for people who want to dance badly and enthusiastically, and sing “Chiquita” at the top of their lungs. It’s a gig where the person sat next to you is going to become your best friend. ABBA Voyage preserves their achievement as the world’s greatest pop band forever, and fans will be able to take leave of their senses to the chorus of “Gimme Gimme Gimme” for as long as they still want to. There are brief stretches of languor when the holograms disappear and a baffling anime film is played. There’s a band of 10, a 20-song setlist, and strobes, beads, and domes of light submerge the crowd. The naff costumes have had a glow up from Dolce & Gabbana, and choreographer Wayne McGregor has helped to recreate the band’s original moves, which are endearingly low-energy.

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Image courtesy of "Purdue Exponent"

ABBA reunite for the first time in over 40 years at launch of ABBA ... (Purdue Exponent)

The iconic pop group, Agnetha Faltskog, 72, Benny Andersson, 75, Bjorn Ulvaeus, 77, and Anni-Frid 'Frida' Lyngstad, 76, opened their long-awaited digital ...

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Image courtesy of "Largs and Millport Weekly News"

Triumph or Abba-ration? What the critics saying about the Voyage ... (Largs and Millport Weekly News)

Abba Voyage has been praised as a “jaw-dropping” and “awe-inspiring” experience by critics who attended its opening night. The virtual concert launched in ...

However, he added: “But for the most part this was captivating, and celebratory in a rather innocent fashion. Inside the purpose-built 3,000-capacity arena at the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in east London, they were backed by a live band of 10 musicians and a complex light show. The virtual concert launched in London on Thursday with a star-studded event attended by the Swedish pop superstars, as well as Kylie Minogue and the king and queen of Sweden.

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Image courtesy of "FRANCE 24"

Pop legends ABBA return to stage, but only as virtual avatars (FRANCE 24)

Performing their much-loved hits like "Mamma Mia!" and "Dancing Queen", Swedish supergroup ABBA returned to the stage on Thursday, albeit as digital avatars ...

It goes right into your heart." Their last performance together was some 40 years ago. "It is so nice to see all the faces and all the expectations and everything.

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Image courtesy of "Smooth Radio"

ABBA Voyage: Reviews and reactions as ABBA bid a euphoric ... (Smooth Radio)

ABBA returned to the stage after a forty year absence, and it was truly euphoric. Here's all the reaction from their debut ABBA Voyage concert in London.

100 minutes of just about every hit you’d list as essential, some fan favourites and 'Don’t Let Me Down' and 'I Still Have Faith in You' from last years Voyage album. Add to the mix a live ten-piece band, a mobile light show that fills the arena, huge HD concert style video screens, hundreds of high quality sound speakers around the auditorium and, well, my my how can you resist it? "There should be an announcement as you enter the new ABBA Arena in Stratford.. “ladies and gentlemen we will soon be landing in 1979 so please turn back your watches 43 years. And a little curtain call at the end. I was prepared to be cynical but the Abba Voyage show blew me away. My jaw hit the floor the moment it began and it’s still down there.

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Image courtesy of "The New York Times"

Abba Returns to the Stage in London. Sort Of. (The New York Times)

The Swedish superstars — or digital versions of them, at least — performed on Thursday to 3000 enthusiastic fans with the help of 140 animators, ...

Ulvaeus said he wouldn’t be surprised if some of the group’s contemporaries consider a similar undertaking: “If they ask me for advice, of course, I would say, ‘It takes a long time and it’s very expensive.’” “I felt very emotional at certain times during that performance, which I’m calling a performance but it wasn’t — it was a projection,” he said. “I was scared what I would find underneath,” Ulvaeus said.) Lyngstad had just had hip surgery and was using a cane. The group needed to get creative because Faltskog and Lyngstad had made it clear that they didn’t “want to go on the road,” Andersson told The New York Times in 2021. Around 2016, Simon Fuller, the producer behind the “Idol” franchise and the Spice Girls, suggested a show starring a 3-D version of the group “singing” while backed by a live band. The idea started around 2014, Gisla said, when she was brought in to help make music videos for the band involving digital avatars, a process that was “a total nightmare,” she said. During test shoots in fall 2019, the group’s male members “leapt in with no qualms,” Ben Morris, I.L.M.’s creative director, said. “We kissed a lot of frogs,” Gisla said. For the stadium disco of “ Summer Night City,” it appeared in pyramids made of dazzling light, with the rings of Saturn twirling in the background. For the Spanish-tinged “ Chiquitita,” the group sang in front of a solar eclipse. As a synthesizer blared and lights pulsed, the singer Anni-Frid Lyngstad twirled her arms skyward, unveiling a huge cape decorated with gold and fire red feathers, while she sang the slow-burn disco of “ The Visitors.” Benny Andersson, poised at his synth, grinned like he couldn’t believe he was onstage again. The audience — some already out of their seats dancing, glasses of rosé prosecco in hand — laughed because the comment went straight to the heart of the event.

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Image courtesy of "Variety"

ABBA's 'Voyage' CGI Extravaganza Is Everything It's Cracked Up to ... (Variety)

“To be or not to be, that is no longer the question,” declared ABBA co-founder and musical mastermind Benny Andersson at the start of “ABBA Voyage,” the ...

After a slow-ish start with the lesser-known songs “The Visitors” and “Hole in Your Soul,” the set delivers the hits just like any ABBA tribute act. But any quibbles are drowned out by a youthful, 10 piece live band — put together by Keira Knightley’s husband, James Righton, formerly of “new rave” sensations the Klaxons — that means “S.O.S” and “Does Your Mother Know?” have rarely sounded so punchy. However, some notable classics, from “Super Trouper” to “Money, Money, Money” and “Take a Chance on Me,” are absent — smart money is surely on versions of these already being in the can for future setlist tweaks. And these avatars certainly capture ABBA’s original exuberance, minus the Jurassic tendencies that tend to blight decades-after-the-fact reunions in the real world. But then, just as when you saw the initially-somewhat-unconvincing dinosaurs in “Jurassic Park” for the first time, your eyes adjust, the willing suspension of disbelief kicks in, and they begin to feel like living, breathing musicians, rather than the product of 160 motion capture cameras and one billion computing hours by Industrial Light & Magic. Alongside him are the similarly CGI-rendered forms of his bandmates, all looking as they did — or, in truth, actually somewhat better than — they did in their ‘70s heyday.

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