International superstars though they may have been, the members of ABBA were not, individually, all that fascinating. If you think the group identity that emerges during, say, their medley of “Pick a Bale of Cotton,” “On Top of Old Smokey,” and “Midnight Special” is less than exciting, check out what Agnetha, Björn, Benny, and Anni-Frid had to say when they met representatives of the press in their capacity as persons. I’m not just being snotty. As I understand it, the absence of personality is a key part of ABBA’s appeal, and I’m all for it. Zero subjectivity—let’s go! In the same way Kraftwerk audiences greet robotic simulacra of Ralf and Florian with ten times the enthusiasm they muster for the actual human beings in the group, I’m counting the days until I can buy tickets to hologram ABBA, even though I probably would not get out of my chair to see plain old meatbag ABBA reform. The collective, or in this case the brand, is everything.

But the ABBA brand itself could not talk to journalists, and compelling TV the meatbags’ interviews did not make. Into this void, BBC cast John Peel, duded up in smarter attire than wardrobe provided on other occasions. Enlivening the proceedings with Peel in this 1993 retrospective were Ray Davies, Elvis Costello, Roy Wood, and Ian McCulloch. Generous helpings of these and other interview subjects, plus clips of ABBA parodies from Not the Nine O’Clock News and French and Saunders, make A for ABBA (in homage to the 1985 TV special A for Agnetha?) the best encapsulation of the band’s story for those of us who are grouchy, impatient, and easily bored.
 

 
One thing we cultural anthropologists of the amazing future year 2017 know that contemporary viewers of this program did not: the lone ABBA LP in John Peel’s collection was their disco record, Voulez-Vous. An orthodox ABBA fan, Peel asserts in A for ABBA that Stig Anderson was the group’s fifth member, ignoring the heresy of the Tretowist deviation. Without discipline, the party of ABBA is nothing!

More ABBA after the jump…

 
Listen to an excellent cover of ABBA’s “SOS” by Portishead. The cover is a single from the soundtrack for the film adaptation of J.G. Ballard’s High-Rise directed by Ben Wheatley. Apparently there’s another cover version of “SOS” on the movie’s soundtrack and that’s an orchestral version by Clint Mansell. I couldn’t find that one online.

 
via Nerdcore

Prince Swedish paper doll (1989)
 
While I was in the process of my very important “research” for a post I did for Dangerous Minds last week on a vintage collection of Swedish bubblegum trading cards, I came across more curious Swedish pop-culture artifacts - paper dolls that were made in the late 60s and 70s of various movie stars and musicians. Groovy.
 

Steve Priest of The Sweet vintage Swedish paper doll
 
The dolls originally appeared in various Swedish magazines. Personally, whoever is responsible for thinking it was a good idea to create a paper doll in the image of Prince (pictured above which is actually dated 1989) in his underwear ready to be dressed up in his finest purple paper suit, is a damn genius.

I’ve included a shit-ton of paper dolls of famous folks like Brigitte Bardot, Bianca Jagger (?) and lollypop enthusiast Telly Savalas (!) after the jump that you can print out yourself and dress up (if that’s how you get your kicks - I don’t judge and neither should you) at home or at work if you’re bored. You can also purchase some of the actual vintage cutouts (which don’t come cheap) on eBay or Etsy.
 

Björn Ulvaeus (ABBA) 1976
 

“Kojak” (played by actor Telly Savalas in the 1970s television cop show Kojak)
 

Michael Nesmith of The Monkees
 

Swedish bubblegum trading card of Mick Jagger, 1967
 
Somewhere in a box in my attic I still have a collection of Topps trading cards that I used to collect (the 80s reboot of Creature Feature and the Charlie’s Angels packs were always my favorites). You’d chuck the nasty gum and go straight away to see if you got anything new, and kept your duplicates in a pile to trade. Those were good times.
 

Tina Turner
 

Slade
 
As I’m often nostalgic for said good times, I was pretty excited when I came across these vintage bubblegum trading cards from, of all places, Sweden. What’s really cool about these cards is that they feature a few sweet images of musical idols from Sweden like Dutch glam-rockers Tears and of course, ABBA. If you’re into collecting these kinds of vintage artifacts (and I know many of you are), they are easily had via eBay. Tons of images follow.
 

ABBA
 

Early 70s London glam rocker, Lady Teresa Anna Von Arletowicz (aka “Bobbie McGee” and “Gladys Glitter”)
 

Thin Lizzy
 
Many more after the jump…

 
“Saturday Morning Cartoons” is a new weekend ritual/feature here at Dangerous Minds. Each week I’ll select a few handpicked—some “troubled,” some quite lovely—drawings, sketches and portraits of your favorite pop idols and movie stars.

This week it’s ABBA’s Agnetha Fältskog. ABBA has always had millions upon millions of hardcore fans and throughout the span of their career and beyond, people have drawn and sketched portraits of the Swedish band. The Internet boasts rather a lot of ABBA fan art, if you’re looking for it.

I have nothing against the brunette, Frida, she’s great, but this week, let’s take a closer look at the blonde… sexy yet innocent-seeming Agnetha Fältskog. Here are a few of my favorites. I hope they brighten your weekend.

Previously on Dangerous Minds:
‘Moog Plays ABBA’: Australian synthesizer record rarity is fantastic goofy fun
ABBA Russian nesting doll set
ABBA live… all over the place
When The Slits met ABBA: ‘Björn was a twat’

 
The mini-craze for Moog synthesizer albums that Switched-On Bach launched in 1968 yielded a bumper crop of kitschy delights, plenty of which are still waiting for you to rescue them from thrift stores. Some of them remain classics—Moog: The Electric Eclectics of Dick Hyman, with its indelible “Topless Dancers of Corfu,” is a keeper, as is Gershon Kingsley’s Music To Moog By, which features the ridiculously catchy “Popcorn,” but plenty of lesser-known efforts in the genre are larded with fun listens.
 

 
Specifically: in 1976, when international ABBA-mania was nearing its height, a wonderful Moog tribute to that band was released on the Australian label TeeVee Records, titled Moog Plays ABBA. The album was made by one Robin Workman, who largely built the songs around traditional rock instruments and played synth leads as stand-ins for vocals. Available biographical data about Workman is mighty scanty, though someone by that name is the longtime director of a company in Sidney called “Keyboard Koncepts.” Amazingly, within a year, following the release of ABBA’s completely HUGE album Arrival, Workman released the album anew—retitled Moog and Guitars Play ABBA: 20 Golden Instrumentals, and given a much less inspired cover—at almost double the original’s length, to accommodate remakes of almost every song from that new ABBA LP! So I guess he really liked it. Here are a few examples, and if this version of “Mama Mia” doesn’t make you smile, you have NO heart.
 

“SOS”
 

“Dancing Queen”
 
More Moogy ABBA after the jump…

 
Along with IKEA furniture, ABBA is probably Sweden’s greatest export. Even considering the amount of cheap press board furniture that I personally have purchased, I’d still have to wonder if it was the pop group or the furniture behemoth that has raked in more money over the years. ABBA are, after The Beatles, the #2 best-selling pop group of all time. And don’t forget Mama Mia! That alone has generated approx $2.7 billion dollars since its West End debut in 1999.

Consider how much money these four people, especially the two songwriters, have generated for their country in tax revues. It’s extraordinary. I recall watching one ABBA documentary—it was years ago, I don’t remember which one—where Benny Andersson was asked (by an American interviewer, natch) about all the money they were making. The young man smiled politely and acknowledged his great wealth and then the guy turned into a smartass and asked him about being overtaxed in a socialist country. Andersson’s eyes flashed in anger—to a certain degree, this jerk was implying he was a sucker to live in the country of his birth!—and he replied something along the lines of being proud to be able to pay that much in taxes to Sweden because it allowed him to live in a just society. And besides that, how much money does he need? Seen from the perspective of a Swede, I would imagine ABBA are more than just musical heroes, they’re the folks who personally picked up the tab for a hell of a lot of stuff.

In any case, I started to poke around YouTube looking for some ABBA to listen to—I’ve been in an ABBA mood lately, you?—and I noticed that ABBA must’ve made a TV special just about every damned time they got off a plane during their career. There is a seemingly endless number of ABBA specials taped in Japan, Switzerland, Germany, Japan, America, England, etc, etc, etc.

They often follow a formula that seems particularly smart when viewed from a manager’s perspective of wringing the most from his charges, but with a minimal effort from them. Many of the shows start off with a jet landing in ____, looking out the window of a taxi or limo footage, a press event of some sort and then on to the show. Every itch is scratched with continuous and very strategic motion. They are moved from place to place and camera crews follow them. (One program saw them lip-syncing on the plane!) Aside from the really spectacular ones taped in the US or Britain, this is what they did and they did it in Poland and in Paris and they did it, like I was saying, in every darned place. And it was pretty formulaic. “The group is going to be going from here to here at this time. You can tag along. They will lip-sync in your studio for no more than five hours starting at this time. The concert is happening then. Take what you get and get whatever you can” seems to be the implied agreement. Back then no one had to worry about the Japanese TV special being too much like the Swiss one, but comparing them on YouTube today it seems pretty obvious how many of them came to be so similar.

ABBA worked hard for their money. That much is pretty clear.

ABBA in Switzerland, 1979

 
This one is simply fantastic (and so awkward!) ABBA in Poland, October 1976

 
More after the jump…
 

 
Ari Up and friend sing a little ABBA, with ABBAesque choreography, no less! I love ABBA, and I love The Slits, so watching Ari Up do a little “Knowing Me, Knowing You” here is the height of comfort. Nothing like a little reassurance that the incredibly uncool music I love was also loved by the incredibly cool Slits!

Ari’s admitted ABBA fandom wasn’t even compromised by a chilly introduction at a record party. ABBA have a reputation for basically being crazy rich eccentrics who rarely descend from whatever Nordic palaces or islands they own to mingle with plebs. Rumors like these are not refuted by Ari calling Björn Ulvaeus a “twat.”
 

 
Yes, totally ridiculous, but I would still own ‘em!

I found a few sets on Amazon for $31.00.

And lastly, for a total mindwarp, ABBA’s “Money, Money, Money” played backwards…