During a livestream announcing their return after 40 years, ABBA talked new music and virtual concert: ‘We\u2019re not competing with Drake!’<\/b>
\nIt\u2019s hard to think of any group of performers that got back together after 40 years apart, and ABBA has not half-stepped the announcement of their return. While it was first announced rather vaguely three and a half years ago, they waited until the time was ripe to do it officially: Via a global livestream that was also aired at special fan events all over the world (including one in New York just hours after record-breaking rainfall and flooding), we got two brand-new songs \u2014 the first new material from the group in nearly four decades \u2014 news of an album due on Nov.5, and what seems to be a completely groundbreaking virtual concert that will premiere in a specially built London arena next May. The center of the hour-long livestream was a long interview with the group\u2019s songwriters, Benny Andersson and Bjorn Ulvaeus, where they talked about the new songs, the album and the concert, which will feature avatars (if the official name isn\u2019t \u201cABBAtars,\u201d it should be) of the four members \u2014 Andersson, Ulvaeus and singers Agnetha F\u00e4ltskog and Anni-Frid Lyngstad \u2014 that were painstakingly created by more than 100 digital artists and technicians from George Lucas\u2019 Industrial Light & Magic special-effects company. Of the album\u2019s creation, Andersson said simply, \u201cFirst it was just two songs, then we said, \u2018Maybe we should do, I don\u2019t know, a few others? What do you say, girls?\u2019 They said yes, then I said why don\u2019t we just do a whole album.\u201d The lead song is the ballad \u201cI Still Have Faith in You,\u201d which actually has a similar feel to tracks from the group\u2019s most recent album, \u201cThe Visitors\u201d (odd as it seems to say that about an album released in 1981). Also like songs from that album, it\u2019s about the members of ABBA and what they\u2019ve meant to each other. \u201cWhen Benny played the melody, I just knew it had to be about us,\u201d Ulvaeus said. \u201cIt\u2019s about realizing that it\u2019s inconceivable to be where we are [today] \u2014 no imagination could dream up that, to release a new album after 40 years, and still be the best of friends and still be enjoying each other\u2019s company and have total loyalty. Who has experienced that?\u201d Asked what the album\u2019s songs and their themes are like, Andersson said, \u201cIt\u2019s a little mixture of everything, like it has been on our records throughout the years. We have a little Christmas tune, it\u2019s called \u2018Little Things,\u2019 and there\u2019s a number of pop songs as well.\u201d Crucially, the two new songs also are age-appropriate for the septuagenarian members: They\u2019re classic ABBA songs that don\u2019t try to adopt new styles or even revive the more dance-oriented sounds of the group\u2019s past. \u201cWe\u2019re not competing with Drake and all these other guys,\u201d Andersson laughed. \u201cWe can\u2019t, because I don\u2019t understand the ingredients in the songs that work today, so it\u2019s impossible to emulate. I don\u2019t mind Drake, I just don\u2019t know what modern pop artists are doing.\u201d Ulvaeus continued, \u201cAt our age, there\u2019s a certain depth to the whole thing, musically and lyrically, and of course the way [F\u00e4ltskog and Lyngstad] sing and the way they deliver. There\u2019s a lot of experience and a lot of years in that I hope people can feel.\u201d As for the show, ILM\u2019s artists and technicians meticulously filmed the bandmembers performing a 22-song setlist over the course of five weeks \u2014 and then essentially reverse-aged them using digital technology. (See the livestream, beginning at around the 22-minute mark, for visuals and more details.) Ben Morris of ILM said, \u201cThey got on a stage in front of 160 cameras and almost as may genius [digital] artists, and performed every song in this show to perfection, capturing every mannerism, every emotion, the soul of their beings \u2014 so that becomes the great magic of this endeavor. It is not four people pretending to be ABBA: It is actually them. The concept is essentially ABBA today performing as their younger selves, Morris continued. \u201cWe create Abba in their prime \u2014 1979 \u2014 as digital characters that we will then use performance-capture techniques to animate and perform them and make them look real,\u201d he said. \u201cThat [process] started with present-day ABBA: We did performance-capture with them, and that\u2019s formed the basis of the whole project.\u201d Andersson cracked, \u201cThe only big problem [in the digital performances] was we had to shave our beards!,\u201d he laughed. \u201cI\u2019ve had mine for 50 years, but they had to get everything right,\u201d for the video recordings, and beards would have complicated the accuracy. \u201cBut Frida and Agnetha didn\u2019t have to shave!,\u201d he laughed. \u201cWe have really infused ourselves into these avatars in so many ways,\u201d Ulvaeus added. As for the big question \u2014 the songs they will perform in the show \u2014 Andersson said, \u201cIt\u2019s sort of a greatest hits, I\u2019d say, but [also] we tried to play a couple of songs that were not great hits but that we like. \u201c\u2018Dancing Queen,\u2019 is going to be in it,\u201d he said to cheers from the audience, \u201cIt\u2019s 22 songs, and hour and a half approximately, and also those two new songs we released today. \u201cWe hadn\u2019t recorded the other [new] songs when we [filmed] this motion thing,\u201d he continued, \u201cbut we said maybe we should do a couple more because it was so joyful to be together in the studio again, the four of us. Hearing Agnetha and Frida go for it again \u2014 and not knowing, really, if it was still there.\u201d Ulvaeus expanded on that reunion to Apple Music in an interview released Thursday, \u201cWe\u2019d see each other every now and then, but it was especially clear when we were in the studio for the first time for this album, together, because that was so strange and wonderful at the same time. Everything came rushing back, like it was yesterday.\u2026 I looked around and I looked into Agnetha\u2019s eyes and Frida\u2019s eyes and there was the same kind of feeling, the warmth and the friendship and the bonds, between us that, as you suddenly realize no one on earth has experienced this kind of relationship that we have because, thinking about it, it\u2019s true, nobody else has. Sadly, people die and they don\u2019t stay on friendly terms for their whole lives, but we have. And I\u2019m so incredibly happy for that.\u201d Andersson added during the livestream, \u201cFive minutes before they got to the studio I was thinking, \u2018I should have asked if they can still sing!,\u2019\u201d he laughed. \u201cBut they could, and can, and have done so, and you\u2019ll hear that.\u201d<\/p>\n