An excellent and very detailed book about ABBA

I thoroughly enjoyed listening to this long audiobook. I have been a fan of ABBA since I first heard Waterloo on the radio in Canada. I too have my own autobiography on Audible and spent many years touring the world giving concerts..In fact ABBAs Danish promoter, Knud, presented me in concert in Copenhagen at about the same time as he was booking their first big tour. I still have the postcard they signed to me with all their names… One of my great treasures today! My only small complaint about this book is that Swedish is a very difficult language for English ears, so it would have been nice if the pronunciations of all the many Swedish song titles had not sounded so belabored as though read phonetically. All it would have taken is the engineer speeding up the Swedish a little as it becomes rather painful after a while. I think the author gives a very unbiased and fair appraisal of the whole fantastic adventure, the ups and downs, The challenges Of the music business and the record labels, the heartbreak the romances and of course most import their amazing songs! I love that he analyzes many of them and I often stopped the audiobook to listen to the songs on Spotify or Amazon. One of the songs I wrote a few years ago is called Near to You, and I like to think it was a little influenced by ABBA :-) I was so thrilled to hear the two new songs they have just released and cannot wait for their new album!

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A deep dive in to the history of all things ABBA

This is a fascinating account of the group and the background of how so much of their story came to be. It’s clear the details were painstakingly researched and they go deep. Well worth the listen!

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BORING!!!

I am a life-long ABBA fan. I've seen all the documentaries. Read the articles. I own almost all their albums. So when I heard there was finally a "true story" of ABBA I bought the audiobook book straight away.

What a disappointment!!! Granted, the author painstakingly researched every single fact and the narration was excellent so we must give credit where credit is due. But this was single-handedly one of the most boring books I have ever had the misfortune of reading.....and it was an audiobook so SOMEONE ELSE read it to me!

It took 18 painful chapters for our four heroes to meet and another 6 before they even formed ABBA. But I knew alllllllll there was to know about the thoughts and feelings of the OTHER members of the Hep Stars and the Hootenanny Singers....and some random roadie....and Benny's ex-fiancee......and the garbage man outside Bjorn's house...and Stig Anderson's mom. Sheeeeesh! this was supposed to be about ABBA, wasn't it?

I bought this to listen to in the car while stuck in traffic.....and often I found myself turning it off and listening to the radio (or nothing) instead. It seriously read like the family tree of the English Royals.......or stereo instructions.

There were some interesting tidbits once the band got going but you have to slog through nearly 30 chapters to get this reward. sadly, it wasn't really worth it.

I'd give this one a hard pass.

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1 person found this helpful