The Book of ABBA

Over half a century after their songs were recorded, ABBA''s songs still make people the world over dance and sing every day, and their ability to evoke every emotion has made them the ultimate soundtrack to major life events, from birthday parties and weddings to heartbreaks and memorials. Since interviewing the four members of ABBA for an article in 2013 - at which time the band had not been interviewed for 30 years - a relationship was sparked between writer Jan Gradvall and the band, and he was granted unique access for the next decade. He has interviewed each of them exclusively for Melancholy Undercover , and they share their thoughts and opinions with him here more openly than ever before. Gradvall places ABBA at the centre of the musical universe, and alongside his fascinating interviews, he gives readers the socio-cultural context of how the band''s sound was formed - including the melancholic hints of Swedish folk music and the dansband culture of their formative years - and shows how the story of ABBA is also the story of Sweden and the internationalisation of pop culture. With around 2 million tickets sold to the ABBA Voyage experience in London since it opened in May 2023, it is undeniable that, in the history of pop culture and music, there has never been a group like ABBA. This remarkably intimate, approved biography brings readers a few steps closer to one of the world''s most famously private bands.

Préface
With exclusive band interviews and over a decade of deep research, in The Book of ABBA, renowned music journalist Jan Gradvall explores the secret to ABBA's success.

Auteur
Jan Gradvall, born 1963, is an award-winning writer and Sweden's most respected music journalist of the last 40 years. He has written several books on popular culture before, but says that Melancholy Undercover 'feels as though everything I've written about music has led up to this book.' Gradvall won Journalist of the Year, awarded by trade organization Sweden's Magazines in 2001 and was instrumental in the founding of the Swedish Music Hall of Fame, for which he served as chairman in its first three years. He has a uniquely close journalistic relationship with ABBA, and has appeared in two BBC documentaries, The Joy of ABBA and Flatpack Pop, about the Swedish songwriting phenomenon, before writing Melancholy Undercover.

Texte du rabat

With exclusive band interviews and over a decade of deep research, in The Book of ABBA, renowned music journalist Jan Gradvall explores the secret to ABBA's success.