The gap between the Voulez-Vous and Tremendous Trouper albums can’t be measured simply by the 19 months that separated the 2 releases. On the daybreak of a brand new decade, ABBA stood at a crossroads – each creatively and as a working crew. 1979’s information that Björn Ulvaeus and Agnetha Fältskog had break up sparked alarm about the way forward for the world’s largest pop group.
Tremendous Trouper’s lead single – the basic ballad “The Winner Takes It All,” launched in the summertime of 1980 – doubtless did little to allay these fears, although Björn denies that the monitor is autobiographical. Behind the scenes, nevertheless, as recording for the album was in full swing, Benny Andersson and Frida Lyngstad’s personal marriage had additionally hit hassle, with a separation already in place because the LP first hit the outlets, on November 3, 1980.
Their private lives apart, the music scene had moved on too. Disco was on the slide, significantly within the US, the place the ABBA phenomenon had by no means correctly caught gentle, and Europe was more and more in thrall to the mannered theatrics of recent wave. ABBA’s response was to pare again the occasion. It actually was time to name that cab after the euphoric rush of Voulez-Vous.
Throughout a good 10 tracks, Tremendous Trouper is sort of a best hits sampler, showcasing all of the kinds that made the group so profitable. “The Winner Takes It All,” often voted the folks’s favourite ABBA report, and a Prime 10 hit in each main market, is the ballad that they by no means actually bettered. Drenched in pathos, it featured Agnetha’s best vocal efficiency and has been claimed as her favourite ABBA monitor.
The ballads dominate the album. “Happy New Year,” as soon as earmarked for vast single launch till the title monitor emerged, is a melancholic choker that effortlessly captures that messy second when the clock strikes midnight. “Our Last Summer” once more bathes us in a sentimental haze of melancholia; nobody does happy-sad songs in addition to ABBA, and the schlager foundations underpinning a lot of their work are very evident right here.
On “Super Trouper,” the final monitor to be recorded, however launched because the album’s second single, the band’s basic European pop sound discovered its latter-day peak. Within the UK, it proved to be their ninth, and last, chart-topper so far.
But it surely wasn’t all doom and gloom. The exuberant roar of the dance basic “Lay All Your Love On Me” confirmed the band nonetheless knew the right way to get us out of our seats. This ahead-of-its-time anthem topped the Billboard dance charts and nonetheless fills flooring to at the present time. Lighter fare comparable to “Andante Andante” and “Me And I,” in the meantime, proved that the usual album materials ABBA produced remained leagues forward of the competitors.
Reside monitor ‘The Method Outdated Mates Do,” lifted from their 1979 tour, closed Tremendous Trouper and, in some ways, sums up the temper of the report. With private {and professional} turbulence surrounding them, the four-piece retrenched right into a protected place – specializing in less complicated pop sounds acquainted to the devoted. In time, the urge for experimentation would return however, for now, they remained content material to be fastened within the highlight that gave the album its title… simply so long as the beam was a bit dimmer.
In any case, it had been one hell of a celebration…
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