ABBA Reunited For The First Time In Years Last Night

Will ABBA ever be “cool?” No. Do you find yourself singing “Waterloo,” or “The Winner Takes It All,” or “Knowing Me, Knowing You,” or any of their other myriad pop-disco hits when there’s no one around? Yes. That guilty pleasure dichotomy is one of the reasons why they’re a karaoke mainstay and, by some estimates, the second-highest selling group of all-time, with a Broadway musical, hit movie, and Mediterranean restaurant to their name.

Mamma Mia — The Party, which sounds like a terrible video game, debuted last night in Stockholm, promising “a magical evening in several acts filled with singing and dancing, daredevil stunts, Greek Gods, flirty waiters, and perhaps a Zorba and an Ouzo or two.” A few special guests dropped by for the opening: ABBA’s Agnetha Fältskog, Anni-Frid Lyngstad, Bjorn Ulvaeus, and Benny Andersson, who haven’t been photographed together for eight years.

All four former members of the Swedish group were in town for the premiere but rejected the idea that they would ever be performing together. When asked how it felt to be at an ABBA event, Benny Andersson said: “This is not an ABBA event. It’s not, so it doesn’t feel like that. We shall see.” (Via)

ABBA’s final public performance was in 1982, and although there’s little animosity between the foursome, it’s unlikely we’ll ever see a full-scale reunion. “I think we have to accept that it will not happen,” Fältskog once said, “because we are too old and each one of us has their own life.”

Here’s an idea: trade Bjorn Ulvaeus for Morrissey. They’re both fond of tasteless jokes, and could convince the rest of The Smiths and ABBA to stop wastin’ time and get to reunitin’. Then again, the world doesn’t need a Smiths-themed restaurant. It would almost assuredly be called Meat Is Murder.

(Via Sky News)