The year 2014 marks the 40th Anniversary of ABBA’s spectacular win at the Eurovision Song Contest with the unforgettable Waterloo, to date the most popular and successful Eurovision winner of all time. It was a groundbreaking moment for the group and marked the start of their career as one of the biggest pop bands of all time.
Throughout 2014 Polar Music International is celebrating the anniversary with a whole raft of special releases. ABBA The Singles is a superb boxed set, comprising 40 vinyl singles originally released during the period 1972–1982.
Of the 40 vinyl singles offered here, 31 are the singles planned and conceived by ABBA’s Swedish record company, Polar Music, which were issued in Sweden and/or the rest of Scandinavia: from the debut People Need Love through legendary hits such as Mamma Mia, Dancing Queen, Knowing Me, Knowing You, Take A Chance On Me, Chiquitita and The Winner Take It All to the final single, Under Attack. The remaining 9 singles in the set were only released by ABBA’s local record companies around the world.
Five of the additional singles here are the German versions of Ring Ring and Waterloo, the French version of Waterloo and the Spanish language versions of Chiquitita and I Have A Dream (Spanish title Estoy Soñando). The West German single Honey Honey/Ring Ring features a 1974 remix of Ring Ring, which also featured as an A-side on singles in Great Britain and Australia. The remaining three selections are ABBA songs that have become very popular over the ensuing decades, but which were originally only released as singles in a few countries. They are the Portuguese Happy New Year; the UK 12-inch, Lay All Your Love On Me (presented here on a 7-inch format) and the Australian release of When All Is Said and Done.
The sleeve and label of each single in this set are exact replicas of the original issues, with just the 9 singles not originally released by Polar Music being given new Polar labels, each corresponding to the design used by Polar during the era when each single was released. The sleeves for those singles have also been slightly modified.
This celebration of ABBA as unsurpassable hit makers is being released as a strictly limited edition.