Abba's Agnetha Fältskog returns with solo song: 'I didn't know if I could do this'

Abba's Agnetha Fältskog has revealed her archetypal caller euphony successful 10 years, a solo opus called Where Do We Go From Here?

The prima says she was was lured backmost to the workplace by shaper Jörgen Elofsson, who oversaw her 2013 album, A.

"He played maine the demo, and the demo was precise good," the Swedish star, 73, told the BBC successful an exclusive interview.

"Originally, it was different miss singing and I said, 'I don't cognize if I tin bash this'. But I did - and it came retired precise well, I think."

A summery portion of pop, the opus finds Agnetha astatine a acquainted crossroads successful a relationship, with lyrics asking: "What if you could beryllium the 1 I retrieve erstwhile I'm aged and grey and looking backmost astatine life?"

The task is built connected the foundations of the dignified, orchestrated ballads of her erstwhile medium -only this time, they person been radically overhauled to make sleek, radio-friendly popular anthems.

"I heard 1 of the aged songs connected the vigor and I started to think, what would hap if you would remix and bash different mentation of the album?" she said.

"Not due to the fact that you don't similar [the original], but due to the fact that it has been 10 years, and what tin you bash with it?"

She took the thought to Elofsson, who has besides written for Britney Spears, Celine Dion and Kelly Clarkson.

"She mentioned it successful a precise speedy way, but I thought, yes, that's interesting," helium recalled.

To trial the concept, helium stripped the medium way Back On Your Radio down to its bare essentials, and rebuilt it astir a syncopated dembow bushed and dreamy Balearic synths.

"We started to perceive and I conscionable felt, oh, this is incredible. How tin Jörgen bash this with my voice?" said Agnetha. "It's the aforesaid singing, truthful I don't cognize however he's done it. It's similar the opus has caller clothes."

The discopop vibe persists passim the reimagined album, which floats on connected an echoey, nostalgic haze.

It's an attack that volition beryllium acquainted to anyone who's heard the recent, dance-inspired overhaul of Sir Elton John's catalogue.

"That Dua Lipa and Elton John opus [Cold Heart] is for definite an inspiration," confirmed Elofsson. "I conscionable loved the mode it's precise almighty and pushing you forward, but the bushed is truly relaxed."

As enactment progressed connected the remixes, Elofsson remembered Where Do We Go From Here? - a opus he'd written with young Swedish creator Kamilla Bayrak - and realised it would beryllium a cleanable fit.

"I mustered up immoderate guts and played the opus to Agnetha and said, 'Wouldn't you conscionable privation to bash this one?'" helium recalls. "And she was like, 'Wow, what a large song'."

Bright, catchy and melodically complex, the way required the prima to scope notes she hadn't deed for years.

"I was a spot tense and a spot tense due to the fact that erstwhile you get older, your dependable changes," she explains, speaking successful a uncommon interview.

"I deliberation my dependable has dropped a small spot successful code oregon successful pitch. So I possibly dependable a small more... not dark, but lower.

"But I inactive tin explicit a batch and I similar to construe the songs. And I did it, and I think it came retired precise well."

Elofsson says: "She doesn't truly judge successful herself from clip to time. But erstwhile she does, that's erstwhile it comes retired - that dependable from erstwhile she was 15 years aged and started singing."

This twelvemonth marks the 55th day of Agnetha's debut single, Jag var så kär (I Was So In Love).

Written portion she worked arsenic a switchboard operator, it topped the Swedish charts, launching a vocation that made her a prima successful her location country.

Unusually for the time, she composed the bulk of her ain material.

"I person written songs for a agelong time, ever since I was 10," she told Swedish teen mag Bildjournalen successful 1968.

"When I get successful the mood, I airy 2 candles - preferably reddish ones - and beryllium down by the piano. And past I travel up with a melody. Mostly a melancholy one."

But thing bigger was connected the horizon.

As the 'A' successful Abba, Agnetha became 1 of the world's astir celebrated women, scoring 18 consecutive Top 10 hits successful the UK alone, equalling a grounds acceptable by the Beatles.

Through it all, Agnetha maintained her receptor for the melancholy - specialising successful ballads of emotion gone wrong, from The Winner Takes It All and Chiquitita to Hasta Mañana and One Of Us.

"I did immoderate of the blessed songs arsenic good - Voulez-Vous and Happy New Year - but it was the bittersweet songs that came retired strong," she says now.

The set archetypal secured their spot successful popular past by winning the Eurovision Song Contest with Waterloo successful 1974 - adjacent aft the UK gave them the dreaded "nil points".

"That was a mistake, I think," laughs Agnetha. "But you English person been truthful benignant to america successful the years after."

By the clip of their planetary breakthrough, she and her bandmate/husband Björn Ulvaeus had already welcomed their archetypal child, Linda.

Their second, Peter, was calved 3 years aboriginal - but the mates were backmost astatine enactment wrong days, walking the reddish carpet for the premiere of Abba: The Movie.

Her devotion to the children explains wherefore a songwriter of her pedigree ne'er achieved immoderate penning credits connected Abba's albums.

"I didn't person immoderate time," she told the BBC successful 2013. "They [Benny and Bjorn] asked maine a batch - but erstwhile we were astatine home, I conscionable wanted to beryllium with my children."

That's not to accidental she was passive successful the studio. Agnetha often contributed ideas for arrangements and harmonic operation that, successful her words, "brightened up the songs".

"We had a batch of amusive successful the workplace but those were long, agelong days," she remembers.

"We didn't person the exertion determination is today, truthful we had to bash everything implicit and implicit again, the old-fashioned way, and we didn't fto it spell until we were satisfied with it.

"We each were perfectionists successful antithetic ways. We ne'er cheated. We did everything ourselves - the harmonies and the choirs and everything. Maybe that's wherefore it inactive sounds truthful classic."

It's nary concealed that Agnetha longed to beryllium astatine home, preferring the regular docket of workplace enactment to beingness connected the road.

"I can't accidental it was easy," she says. "And Bjorn is the father, truthful we some had to permission the children. But yet we agreed that we cannot beryllium distant for excessively long, truthful we ever went location aft possibly 2 oregon 3 weeks and stayed determination for a while. That helped us."

Is determination a portion of her that wishes the 3D avatar exertion of Abba Voyage - a performance utilizing integer versions of the set - had existed backmost successful the 70s?

"I don't spot it that mode due to the fact that it [touring] had its charm, of course, to spot each the radical that truly loved america - and inactive emotion us. But it was hard leaving home."

The vocalist attended the opening nighttime of Abba Voyage successful London past year, sitting successful the spaceship-sized auditorium for the duration of the show, surrounded by adoring fans of each ages.

Watching a integer recreation of her younger aforesaid connected signifier was decidedly a "strange experience", she says.

"I inactive don't cognize however they did it, really, but the effect is enormous.

"Mainly I thought, 'Oh, did I creation that well?' I've ne'er been a maestro astatine dancing. We went by feeling - what we expressed was however we felt, determination and then."

The process of moving connected the virtual amusement led Abba backmost to the signaling workplace to marque their archetypal workplace medium for 40 years, besides called Voyage, earning the quartet their archetypal ever Grammy nomination.

The band's 50th day falls adjacent twelvemonth when, coincidentally, the Eurovision Song Contest returns to Sweden.

"You ne'er cognize thing astir ABBA - but I don't situation to accidental thing due to the fact that I don't cognize what they are planning," she says. "I'd alternatively beryllium quiet."

The speech circles backmost to the solo album. Although the tracklist has been shuffled since 2013, the closing opus remains the same: I Keep Them On The Floor Beside My Bed, a uncommon Agnetha original, which is steeped successful sepia-toned reminiscences of a erstwhile flame.

It's a taxable she has returned to crossed her career. Why does the taxable of nonaccomplishment and searching for emotion inactive intrigue her?

"But I mean, each opus you perceive to is astir love," she protests. "That's the mode it is. It wouldn't beryllium the aforesaid to sing astir thing political."

But if her lyrical preoccupations person remained changeless since that Bildjournalen interrogation 55 years ago, Elofsson's accumulation does the unthinkable - filtering her dependable done vocoders and Auto-Tune and a myriad of modern integer effects.

"We've been precise cautious with those kinds of things," helium says. "We wanted to dainty her vocals similar they're holy, truthful erstwhile we usage those things, it's much for effect.

"I retrieve the archetypal clip I had her successful the workplace and she started doubling her dependable [recording a 2nd vocal way to adhd depth], I started crying because, you know, this is Abba. I was a kid again, listening to the vigor successful the kitchen."

And 1 happening is wide - the manipulated vocals would ne'er person appeared without Agnetha's seal of approval.

"I'm precise proud," she smiles successful agreement.

"I've listened to it truthful overmuch that I can't retrieve what the archetypal sounds like."