Beyond Mamma Mia!: Essential ABBA tracks, from the Gold to the obscure
Sure, we all know the hits—but for every “Dancing Queen,” there's a host of fantastic lesser-known tracks from the Swedish music legends
Music Features ABBA
If someone asked you to make a playlist of classic ABBA tunes, there’s one simple place you’d start: with the Gold. That 1992 compilation, which has served as the go-to collection of greatest hits from the iconic Swedish pop stars for nearly thirty years, went six times platinum in the U.S. (and is among the best selling albums of all time, globally) for a reason. Namely, it’s filled top-to-bottom with some of the most commercially successful songs the group ever released.
The foursome—Agnetha Fältskog, Björn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson, and Anni-Frid Lyngstad—had already achieved some success in their native country by 1974. But it was that year, when the group became Sweden’s first victors at the Eurovision Song Contest (with “Waterloo,” notably sung in English rather than their native tongue), that ABBA found the international acclaim it had been seeking. Here in the States, that meant 20 singles in the Billboard Hot 100 during their decade of activity, nearly all of which were subsequently put together for the release of Gold.
But for a band that’s released more than 100 songs (and with the release of new album Voyage, that number is growing), any greatest-hits compilation is bound to leave some of the best material behind. Releases like 2012’s 39-track The Essential Collection goes some way toward rectifying this, but that’s still more than half the group’s discography that remains unknown to the vast majority of listeners. As a result, The A.V. Club has decided to put together an “essential ABBA” playlist, one that blends the instantly recognizable hits—you now, the songs that can entice even your reticent aunt to the family reunion dance floor—with an amalgam of the best music from the Swedes that rarely sees the light of day.
For every top-ten hit, we’ve paired it with a lesser-known number that showcases not only more great music from ABBA, but highlights the band’s penchant (soon to be followed by the cavalcade of ABBA-influenced Swedish acts over the years) for blurring genres with aplomb. While some acts have remained forever associated with disco (those poor Bee Gees just can’t seem to escape always and forever being seen as a disco band), ABBA’s reputation has evolved over the years to include its multifarious, hybrid-style music making. The following songs emphasize that point; whether getting asses on the dance floor or breaking hearts with ballads, ABBA’s talent for tuneful perfection remains singular.
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At least two of these, if not more are on More Gold, although that may only be an import in the US.
Solid list, but I was hoping to see “Does Your Mother Know” on this list.
Solid? It’s scarcely even adequate. No “The Day Before You Came”, no comment. Where’s the Kraftwerk-esque “Me And I”? The Visitors* stunning title track? The massively underrated stomper “Summer Night City”? “Andante Andate”’s absolute filth, or the glorious fuck-you of “So Long”? “Eagle”’s soaring widescreen bravado or the deeply uncomfortable “I’m A Marionette”?It’s lists like these that are one of the principal reasons I don’t come here any more. Put in some bloody effort!* The Visitors deserves to be on the list of Top Ten Best Albums Of The 80’s alongside the likes of Murmur, Strangeways, Doolittle and Hounds Of Love, and would be if it had been recorded by anyone other than Abba. It’s that good.
I love “Andante, Andante,” but I’m not putting it on a must-hear list where I’m balancing classics with unknowns. It’s an outlier—a great one, but an outlier nonetheless.
But no The Visitors?!
The Visitors is an incredible album
Most of those are on More Gold.
‘bang-a-boomerang’ or GTFO
“The Name of the Game” was mine.
It drove me crazy that the first release of Gold used the radio edit of Name of the Game–ruins the momentum (they since included the full version)
I think they each took a song from Gold and tried to find a deeper cut. This is on Gold.
“Waterloo” is the greatest song in the history of pop music, and I’ll accept no argument. It’s unbelievably catchy and the premise of comparing surrendering to love to Napoleon’s defeat is incredibly clever.
Can I get a sequined skull cap?
I submit into discussion two honorable mentions: Nobody’s Side and One Night in Bangkok, both from the musical Chess. Ulvaeus and Andersson wrote the music, with Ulvaeus writing the lyrics.
Tim Rice wrote the lyrics for CHESS
Rice wrote some of the lyrics and all of the spoken lines. Majority of lyrics were by Ulvaeus.
I’m afraid you’re wrong, CHESS was Rice’s passion project, and he was the lyric-writer – as he has been on every other show he’s done. Ulvaeus provided dummy lyrics to “emphasise the rhythmic patterns of the music” – and there were a few (“One night in Bangkok makes a hard man humble”) that Rice thought were so good that he ended up using them. But Rice was the lyric-writer.
And the lyrics are so very very Rice (for mostly good that sometimes bad :P) that I would be surprised if anyone who paid attention to them thought they were Ulvaeus. Also, to the earlier poster, Chess on the concept album, and in London (and some places since) is through-sung, so there aren’t really any spoken words for Rice to write unless one means random lines in songs. Rice doesn’t write spoken books for musicals (when the show, disastrously, became a more traditional book musical on Broadway, playwright Richard Nelson wrote the overly talky book (aka spoken words 😛 ).
To back up your unimpeachible argument….
Yeah Tim Rice’s involvement and the fact that… well no one from ABBA sings them means they don’t count, as much as I adore Chess. There is a worthy list to be made of Benny/Bjorn tracks NOT written for ABBA though (I’m a big fan of Another You Another Me and This Like That from their Gemini work—the siblings who sang back up on One Night in Bangkok)
Has to be done:
“Angeleyes” is the only song worth seeking out that’s not on Abba Gold.
I was happy to see that song listed here. I was utterly obsessed with it when I was in 10th grade.
And it is on More Gold which is pretty essential. So not all that obscure…
Guess you didn’t want to take a chance on ‘Take a Chance On Me’?
Yeah, what the hell?
Even as a pre-pubescent kid, I found it hard to suspend my disbelief while watching that video. The idea of those girls basically throwing themselves at those boys just seemed utterly absurd to me.
My mind was blown the moment I realised that the keyboard hook from Oliver’s Army was lifted directly from Dancing Queen. Apparently Arrival was playing almost constantly on Elvis Costello’s tour bus.
Where’s Name of the Game?! That slightly reggae guitar lick or whatever it is at the start is the best thing they ever did.Actually its the second best thing. Starting Dancing Queen halfway through the refrain IS genius and still suprises me every time.
I know the Mamma Mia! movies aren’t great, but I genuinely like the covers of “Honey Honey” and “When I Kissed the Teacher.”
I think the Mamma Mia! movies are pretty much fine as distillations of ABBA, juekbox musicals that don’t try to be anything else. I actually prefer the second to the first as that digs more into the lesser known ABBA hits (which tend to be my favorites from them) and I preferred Lily James’ more nuanced take to the OTT stuff from Meryl (although I do think Meryl was a big reason why the first film was so popular). And many of the songs are genuinely good covers, yes. Cher’s Fernando is also good. Christine Baranski’s ridiculously camp take on Does Your Mother Know? also makes the song more fun and less skeevy.
Four tracks from Voulez-Vous and just one from each of Super Trouper and The Visitors is an odd choice (and you didn’t even pick the best song on Voulez-Vous, “The King Has Lost His Crown”). Anyway, the title track on Visitors is essential, as is “The Winner Takes It All.” I’ll also shout out some late non-album singles and B-sides: “Under Attack”, “Cassandra”, and “Should I Laugh Or Cry” are some of their best songs.
Voulez-Vous is a weird album overall – their only outright disco album, and the only one in their back catalogue not to be better than the album that precedes it. It’s bizarrely over-represented in this list.
I disagree–it’s not their best album but is my fave of theirs. But to each their own (and yeah, out of picking the obvious hits, no Winner Takes it All??)
What would your favourite album of theirs be?
Voulez-Vous! As I said. Partly for sentimental problems. Partly cuz it’s their most disco-heavy (it always amuses me that ABBA for a long time were lumped in with disco when, even compared to the Beegees, they weren’t really a disco group), partly because I think nearly every track could have been a single.
But, and I know this isn’t a very original thought, their *best* album is definitely The Visitors. With the caveat that I mean The Visitors’ later editions which included the singles The Day Before You Came, Under Attack and I Am the City (is that cheating?)
I don’t know if it’s cheating but certainly “The Day Before You Came” is one of the best singles ever released. And I have a real soft spot for Under Attack – it’s not on a par with the material from The Visitors but it’s still a fun, 80’s synth-y single.Also, even given TDBYC, is there a more perfect career conclusion than “Like An Angel Passing Through My Room”?
The exclusion of TWTIA is baffling to me.
I first heard SOS first done by a EuroMetal band called At Vance… thought it was an original until I actually heard the original ABBA song.https://open.spotify.com/track/09EhJo6VIztWTaDgbIU6os?si=bba3e2bf1daf46ad
There’s also an SOS cover by Canadian punk band The Headstones
Once long ago, when I was really fucked up, a girlfriend and I were sitting on a couch when this song came on. I sang to her – changing the lyrics only slightly: “Chiquitita you and I are fri-ied…”
There’s some serious Olan Mills moments in the ‘Knowing Me Knowing You’ video.
I feel like it’s a sign of growing ever more mature as a music lover and adulthood when you give up all the natural hang ups people have with ABBA and accept their greatness. There was a time when I would pretend I “hated” Dancing Queen” but now I crank it proudly. But only when nobody can hear it because a lot of people still have those hang ups.
Perhaps the next signpost is when you find you no longer particularly care who hears…
“Nina, Pretty Ballerina”, from their first album, is straight up a Silly Song with Larry, and I love that 🙂
No The Day Before You Came? Really? Possibly their finest piece of work, and very dangerous when you’re in a lonely, vodka-fuelled emotional state…
Fun bit of playing around, but it’s as though you guys don’t know the name of the game.
Thirty years folks. Thirty years. I don’t want to acknowledge it either.
While I could take part in the friendly back and forth about what was included and what wasn’t, I just want to thank this feature for reminding me just how solidly awesome Gold is.
I tend to agree with your Voulez Vous picks, especially If It Wasn’t For The Nights (talk about an earworm). My other picks: I Wonder – a true melancholy gem of ABBA’s brief “mini-opera” flirtation – a phenomenally acted and sung vocal by Frida…it even almost got into Mamma Mia 2 (it’s up as a deleted scene)Cassandra – a bit metallic, as this was when ABBA was at their coldest, but it’s still a haunting ballad of helplessness and regret, beautifully sung. Should I Laugh Or Cry? – one of ABBA’s bleakest numbers, performed to desiccated perfection by Frida, the wife who can barely contain her loathing for everything about her husband. Contains my favorite ABBA lyrics: “in the striped pajamas that I bought/trousers too short” Summer Night City – both SNC and Lay All Your Love On Me are my favorite of ABBA’s “I just want to go get some dick” catalogue, but this one has the edge for me as the chorus is top notch and I love the matter-of-factness of Agnetha’s lyrics and delivery.Dum Dum Diddle – yes, it’s a very silly, slight song, but dammit if you don’t get carried away with that beat and let it take you wherever it wants to go. Probably the ABBA song I most ENJOY listening to. (honorable mention: That’s Me, with my second favorite ABBA lyrics, “I’m Carrie/not the kind of girl you marry.”)Dance While The Music Still Goes On – the best combination of Agnetha’s fondness for Doris Day-era tunes and Benny and Bjorn’s love of ‘60s American pop. Santa Rosa – There’s a very good reason why Benny and Bjorn took a vocal backseat to two of the finest singers of their era (or any era), but I have a big soft spot for this thudding slice of Americana. “Ba ba ba ba ba” indeed. (honorable mention goes to Merry-Go-Round) Move On – Ahead of their time as always, ABBA gives us their own unique, much better version of the spoken word inspirational songs that often littered album tracks in the ‘80s and ‘90s, occasionally hitting the big time. Thank You For the Music – Absolutely gorgeous. Earnest, cheesy in all the best ways, straight from the heart. ABBA at its best. This type of song was often parodied in the ‘70s and ‘80s as shameless, self-involved crooner schmaltz, but it was and impossible for anyone to sneer at this song, as every breath from Agnetha is utter sincerity. A love letter to fans, then, now, and always.
Lifelong (since the age of 10) Abba fan here. “Should I Laugh or Cry” is their best song, and glad to see someone here mention it!
I think this is the first time I’ve seen another fan of the song. Proud moment.
My favorite lyric of the year“I have learned to cope, and love and hope is why I am here now”
That’s how you take a Tinder portrait. Make them know, now matter what, you have your own back.
I guess I know ABBA far better than I thought (I did date two guys who were full on obsessed, to be fair) as I didn’t even realize some of the “rare” picks here weren’t singles. Glad to see two of my faves, As Good as New and If It Wasn’t for the Nights from their most disco-tastic album, Voulez-Vous. (As Good as New at least got a number of live performances…
“No better case could be made for the idea that Andersson and Ulvaeus
could have a great second career in musicals, should they so choose.”
I mean while the Broadway version was a bomb, and it’s never had one standardized version, Chess definitely counts as a musical theatre hit. And Kristina was a massive hit in Sweden (and has a worthwhile English concert recording—unlike Chess it’s not as recognizably ABBA but is great if a bit too indebted to 80s UK megamusicals), so, yeah… They have had a great second career in musicals.
Oh and King Kong song? Really? Out of all the choices out there?
Where is “Lay All Your Love On Me”?
And where, most importantly, is “The Visitors”?
If you haven’t heard “The Visitors”, go and listen to it immediately.
This is my jam.And you may not know, but there’s a Spanish language version of Gold called Oro and it’s awesome. Fucking kinja. The song is Head Over Heels.
There’s no doubt this new ABBA album is pure cheese, but I like cheese lol
I consider the fact that so many people are on here criticizing this list and offering up their own as more of a testament to the genius of ABBA, and less of a knock on the list (which I consider generally pretty solid). The rare mega-pop band whose deep cuts and album tracks are often just as good or better than the stuff that makes the compilations!