abba voyage production company

ABBA Voyage’s creators tell us how they made the show, and what’s next

Producers, the director and choreographer reveal what went into the ambitious new show

The team behind the creation of the new ABBA Voyage live experience have spoken to NME about how it was made, as well as what could be next for both the show and the band. Watch our video interview above.

• READ MORE: ABBA Voyage reviewed: an epic avatar mega-mix from a brave new world

Premiering earlier this week at the purpose-built ABBA Arena in Stratford, East London, to a delighted response from fans, the ambitious production sees a “digital” version of ABBA (or ‘ABBAtars’) performing alongside a 10-piece live band ( put together with the help of Klaxons’ James Righton ).

Working on the show with ABBA were Svana Gisla (who produced Jay-Z  and  Beyoncé ‘s On the Run Tour), choreographer Wayne McGregor, Johan Renck (who directed  David Bowie ‘s videos for ‘Blackstar’ and ‘Lazarus’), Baillie Walsh (who has directed for  Massive Attack  and  Bruce Springsteen ) and producer Ludvig Andersson (son of ABBA’s Benny Andersson and producer of  And Then We Danced ,  Yung Lean ‘s ‘In My Head’ and  Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again ).

“We did an awful lot of research and development on this, as you can imagine,” Gisla told NME from the red carpet. “We did two years of trying to figure out what this is. We put a lot of time into the philosophical side of it. This is not just about technology, this is about emotion. We wanted to understand the core of ABBA and the music and how to deliver it in 2022.

“A lot of this is about restraint. When all of the technology and everything is available to you, it becomes an exercise in restraint. The music is the guiding light.”

Gisla said that there was “nothing nostalgic about this concert apart from the music”, and that the whole approach was very forward-thinking.

“ABBA look like they did in 1979, but they’re firmly rooted in the now and in the future. Everything else is as forward as it can be,” she said. “You’re going to see a lot of things that you’ve never seen before. The feeling of being inside the arena will be unique, it’s very immersive. People use that word a lot, but when you go in there you’ll fully realise the capabilities of an immersive environment. It’s like being in the eye of the storm.”

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Asked about how long the show could be set to run for, Gisla replied: “I don’t want to jinx it, but if this is a success then we can be here for a few years. We’re on borrowed land, we didn’t break any ground, the arena is moveable and we can pack up and leave when we aren’t wanted anymore.

“I hope the audience wants us to stay for a bit, because we feel like we’ve made something really special.

Director Baillie Walsh, meanwhile, said it was surreal that the “dream” from inside his head finally now on the stage for people to see. Walsh sternly denied that what fans would be seeing was “a hologram”, and in fact something quite different.

“We filmed ABBA for five weeks,” he said. “Wayne McGregor extended their moves into younger bodies – our doubles – and we blended those performances together. Now we have our 2022 ABBA.

“It was very emotional every day. It was like NASA in having so many people in the studio every day, but the whole studio were in tears most days. It was really extraordinary.”

Asked why it was necessary to build their own venue for the project, Walsh said that it was needed to match the ambition of the concept.

“ABBA’s ambition for this project was a beautiful thing, and it was a creative ambition, rather than a money-making exercise,” he said. “Building the arena was just part of that. You can have more lights because you’re not moving around from venue to venue and it’s bespoke. I could design the show around this building.”

As for how long the show could be set to run in London for, he said: “It’s up to the fans really. I hope it’s a destination for a long, long time.”

It is now believed that the concept could be copied for other veteran acts, but Walsh said it might not be so easy to imitate.

“ABBA were so involved in this,” he said. “They’re the heart and soul of it. There aren’t many bands like ABBA around. A posthumous show wouldn’t have the same kind of feeling. The fans know that ABBA are involved and that this isn’t a cynical exercise. This is ABBA.”

Choreographer Wayne McGregor agreed – detailing what went in to capturing the pop icons’ dance moves and movements.

“We’re using a process called motion capture, which you’ve probably seen in movies,” he said. “We use these little dots to take the maths out your body. We take all these zeroes and ones and put them into a computer and build an avatar. It’s a long process. It captures the essence of you, but then we really have to work into that.

“I was taking dance moves from them – I wouldn’t dare show ABBA dance moves. I just wanted them to be themselves and get them back into their performance energy, because they haven’t performed for a while. Then I had to work with the body doubles to transform some of that amazing physical from the ‘70s into maths and find a way of combining the two.”

Enjoying those weeks of having the band perform and sing before him, McGregor described their time together as “perfect”.

“It’s insane to have those amazing performers sing their whole catalogue in front of you,” he said. “They were so bold, brave and into it. It was really exciting. How amazing is it to have this legacy project where you can see ABBA over and over again? It’s a piece of theatre, a piece of performance, a concert like no other. You really feel like you’re inside the music and that’s fabulous.”

He added: “For this show, the technology marries emotion and brings the emotion of those songs directly into you. I love the fact that audiences can actually come in and dance while watching. I’ll be back, every Friday night!”

Co-executive producer Renck, said that he ranked his experience of working with ABBA among his bucket-list projects of working with Bowie, but “in a very different capacity”.

“My entire upbringing was about music,” he told NME . “Everything that is me is music in one way or another. It’s the most important thing for me ever, and the life journey of being seven or eight-years-old and my mother playing ABBA in the car to being here now is a pretty substantial thing, isn’t it?”

He remained coy about details of the show itself, but said: “I’m not going to tell you anything because it’s better to just come and witness it. It’s a very unique experience in all sorts of ways. Whether you’re an ABBA fan or not.

“I’m using the word ‘experience’ a lot, but it takes you to a place you haven’t been before.”

We also asked each of the team if they felt that this really could be the last we see of ABBA.

“I think this is the final thing,” replied Gisla. “They’re quite genuine in that, but they’ve said that before. I think this is it. It took a lot to make and it was hard work, from us and from them.”

Walsh also said that he “didn’t think” ABBA would reunite for any projects again, while Renck added: “Who knows? I’m sure that some of these four do not see it as an endgame, in any shape or form. Benny is music, that’s what he lives, breathes and does every day. That’s never going to stop. Whatever iteration that comes out, who knows? But I don’t think there’s any kind of punctuation to be had.”

Watch our full video interview with the creators of ABBA Voyage at the top of the page.

All four members of ABBA also spoke to NME on the red carpet , telling us about the experience of reuniting and what might be on the horizon for the band.

When asked if the concert was a parting gift from the band, Björn Ulvaeus said: “I think this is it. It’s sad to say that but then again, you can always take it back, can’t you? So the answer is, it could be yes, it could be no.”

Meanwhile, Benny Andersson joked: “This is what you’ll see, this is what you’ll get. Then we’ll go home and we’ll sleep.”

In a five star review of ABBA Voyage ,  NME  concluded: “Ageing rockers and poppers are bound to imitate the idea, but it’ll be a struggle to come close to the experience of ABBA Voyage. We for one welcome our new ABBAtar overlords, if only for giving these songs back to us in a totally new and joyful way.”

Visit here for tickets and more information .

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Super Trouper

Baillie Walsh, the mastermind behind ABBA Voyage, the blockbuster “virtual concert” in London, on the making of a game-changing spectacular, the future of live performance, plus his own amazing adventures in the worlds of pop, performance, music and film

The British film director Baillie Walsh is a man of many parts. He broke through as a director of music videos, initially with Boy George and then the Bristol trip hop collective Massive Attack, for whom he made the promo for the magnificent “Unfinished Sympathy”, from their era-defining 1991 album, Blue Lines. Later he directed memorable videos for Kylie Minogue, INXS, New Order and Oasis.

Walsh has made numerous award-winning commercials; acclaimed shorts; documentaries about music ( Springsteen & I ); and about filmmaking ( Being James Bond: The Daniel Craig Story ). He has written and directed a feature film, 2008’s Flashbacks of a Fool , starring that same Daniel Craig as a faded Hollywood star — narcissistic, hedonistic — forced to confront his past in 1970s Britain. (Don’t worry, Daniel, it’ll never happen!) For the finale of an Alexander McQueen fashion show, in Paris in 2006, he created a hologram of Kate Moss. I was in the audience for that show. It was beautiful, ghostly, and oddly moving.

Testimonials from prominent collaborators are not hard to come by. Moss, no slouch herself in this department, talks about his “sense of style and incredible taste.” Kylie mentions his incredible “capacity to convey emotion.”

“At his heart,” says Daniel Craig, “Baillie is a showman. The incredibly hard work that goes into all his projects is for one purpose: to move an audience, to give them a totally new experience, to affect them emotionally and spiritually and send them away with smiles on their faces.”

All of which could accurately be said of the 62-year-old’s latest project. It is perhaps his most high profile, and ground-breaking, to date. ABBA Voyage, which embarks seven times a week, including matinees, from the purpose-built, 3,000-capacity, spaceship-like ABBA Arena in Stratford, east London, opened in May to reviews that might reasonably be characterised as ecstatic. “Jaw-dropping,” marvelled the Guardian . “Mind-blowing,” panted the Telegraph .

I saw the show in early July. It is that rare thing: an event that exceeds its hype. It is, not to sound too fulsome, an astonishment. It is, also, a potential game-changer for the music industry and even for the idea of “live performance” — whatever that means after one has seen it.

ABBA Voyage has been described as a “virtual concert”. The former members of one of the most beloved and successful pop groups of all time — that is, Agnetha Faitskog, Bjorn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson, and Anni-Frid Lyngstad — do not appear on stage in person. But they do appear. (ABBA disbanded in 1982; although they reconstituted the group five years ago, and have since released new music, it’s been over four decades since they gave a public concert.)

Instead of flesh and blood ABBA, the show is performed by life-sized, animated CGI avatars of the four members, restored by technology to their pop star primes. (ABBAtars, the producers call them.) But it’s also performed by the real ABBA, in the sense that they sang the songs, and danced the dances, in a studio in Sweden, and motion-capture technology allowed those performances — the singing, the dancing, even the chat between the songs — to be combined, on “stage”, with a live 10-piece band and a spectacular light show. The effect is uncanny. It’s not quite correct to say one feels oneself to be present at an ABBA concert in 1979. You are aware (just about, and sometimes not even) that it is 2022, and that in real life the members of ABBA don’t look like that anymore. But you are also conscious that you have entered another world — a virtual world, which is not to say you’re not in it — where you can be thrilled and moved by the power and beauty of some of the most familiar songs in the pop canon, those gorgeous, melancholic bangers that only those four people, together, could have made. The show might be virtual, but the feelings it evokes are genuine. I know, I felt them.

ABBA Voyage benefits from the talents of thousands of technicians and creatives: among others, a huge team from Industrial Light & Magic, the Hollywood visual effects powerhouse; the brilliant British choreographer Wayne McGregor; Swedish costume designer B Akerlund, whose clever modernising of the band’s stage wardrobes gives the show its convincing retro-contemporary feel; the live band; producers Ludwig Andersson and Svana Gisla. But if the Voyage is a trip, and it certainly is, then Baillie Walsh is the man at the controls.

Slim, tanned, and handsome behind dark glasses — so youthful, in fact, that one wonders if this is really him, or a CGI avatar of his younger self? — Walsh arrives on the dot for his Esquire interview, at a hotel in Soho on a Tuesday morning (he lives just around the corner), orders a cup of English breakfast tea and settles himself at a quiet table. He talks for close to two hours, with barely a pause: about ABBA, avatars, his three decades and counting in film and music, and his own extraordinary backstory, from teenage tearaway to Top of the Pops and beyond…

The conversation below, as they say, has been edited and condensed. (A lot.)

Let’s start with how you got involved with the ABBA project. What happened?

One of the producers, Svana Gisla, I’ve worked with many times. I made Springsteen & I with her. A Kylie video, an Oasis film. And she was working with [Swedish director] Johan Renck on this project, and then he had this enormous success with [acclaimed HBO series] Chernobyl . So he saw a film opportunity and didn’t want to do this. [Raised eyebrow.]

Lucky for you!

Lucky for me. I had a Zoom call with Benny and Bjorn and they said yes on that call. That’s where it all began, three years ago.

How far developed was the idea when you signed up?

Johan had done a road map and there was a set list, which came from ABBA. But it was a very rough idea. They knew they wanted to make younger versions of themselves, that was ABBA’s idea. Whether that was going to be holograms or whatever, that was still up for grabs. So I came on board and there was a gradual process of: “What is this thing going to be?” The creative process on something like this is long, because it’s so big. You’re not doing one song. You’re asking, “What is this monster, what can it be?” So, my first job was to sit down and think about what I would want to go and see. I always played it like that. Then it was about talking to ILM about what would be possible. Ben Morris, the creative director there, was really brilliant to work with. And he loved the challenge, the idea of having life-sized avatars, and wanting to feel like they are really there .

Was there a Eureka moment where you said, “I know what this should be! It’s a live concert given by CGI performers!”

There was a few. When I realised, first of all, they have to be life-sized, that the audience has to feel like they are there. I knew it wasn’t going to be holograms. Holograms are so limiting, in the sense that you can’t light them. So then it was, “What does that mean?” We want life-size avatars but we want to see them really big, in detail, like you have at a concert, with the big screens. So we want those iMAG screens.

IMAG screens, for those of us who don’t know…

Those big screens, so when you go to see Beyonce, and she’s the size of a bean, you can see her close-up. But this isn’t the O2, where you’re so far away you can’t see or hear or feel what’s going on.

Your arena is much smaller than that.

That’s part of the success of the thing, I think, that arena. It’s really quite intimate. You can see every face in there, and the excitement spreads. I mean, there are many reasons for the success of this, so far. Lots of magic has happened. I’m a part of that, but the fact that it’s ABBA, the fact that they are still alive, and contributed enormously to this, and their soul is in this. The fact that they haven’t toured for 40 years, so there’s a great hunger to see them live, in whatever form. The arena, which is the perfect size, I think. And also so well designed, so comfortable. It doesn’t feel like you’re going to a horrible, beer-stinking arena, with turnstiles. From the moment you arrive, it’s already exciting. Like, “What the hell is this ?”

Because it could have been a disaster.

Yes. It could have been a disaster, so easily.

Because it’s a very weird idea.

Yes! Totally. The whole thing I fought against is the tech, being led by the tech. The tech should be the least important thing. The important thing is the emotion. I want people to laugh, dance, cry. And you’ve got to be really careful with that. It’s multi-layered, because you are playing with the past, the present and future. And all of those big questions. You can’t throw that in people’s faces. The concert isn’t a big intellectual idea. And I never tried to intellectualise it. But I knew there were lots of big ideas under the surface.

There’s a lightness of touch to it that’s very appealing. And, of course, in the moment, unless you’re weird, you are not trying to deconstruct it. You’re just enjoying yourself. But afterwards I certainly was provoked to think about mortality, ageing, nostalgia…

But you can’t be heavy handed with those things. All I ever thought was, if I’m feeling emotion, if the ideas for presenting the songs resonate with me, then I’m on to something. Because I am the audience. So if it chokes me up, it’s going to choke everyone else up.

There are some people who feel that emotion stimulated by technology is somehow cheaper. That it’s inauthentic, in some way. That a concert given by avatars is fake.

The interesting challenge was: how can we fall in love with an avatar? That was the challenge. I wanted to do that, to fall in love with an avatar. And I did! The soul of ABBA is in those avatars. Their voices, those speeches, everything they say, the soul is there. It’s irrelevant that it’s an avatar. I mean, it’s helped by the fact that it’s ABBA, and their music is very emotive. That’s a massive advantage. If it had been Black Sabbath, it would have been harder to fall in love with the avatars. But ABBA’s songs, everyone has a connection to those songs. They are part of our DNA. They are part of who we are.

Talk a bit about the process of creating the avatars. How did you do it?

Basically, we were in a studio in Sweden for five weeks, with ABBA. And we filmed them with 160 cameras, in motion-capture suits. We went through the whole set list, and more, and they performed those songs for the cameras. It was a very bizarre, amazing experience. You’re in this kind of NASA-style studio, with monitors and cameras everywhere, and 100 people in there taking all the data. A very bizarre situation. As individuals they are really lovely people, but the moment you bring those four people together, something happens. This strange alchemy. Which is a really rare thing. I mean, I’m sure it happens when the Stones come together, or when the Beatles came together. This extraordinary energy. I don’t want to get all woo-woo about it. But it’s perceptible. When they came together on that stage, on the first day, it’s goosebumps. It’s a magical thing. And that’s why I feel so lucky to have got this gig and to have been able to do what I’ve done, with ABBA. I can’t think of another band who would be better than them for this project. I’m spoilt now. I’m fucked, really. I’ve made something that hasn’t been done before, which is a really rare opportunity. How am I gonna top this?

That was going to be my last question. I was going to leave your existential crisis for later.

Now that you mention it though…

I haven’t had time to think about it. I’ve been on this project for three years and I’ve had four days off. I finish on Thursday and go to Iceland on Saturday.

For a holiday?

I’ve got a house there. This’ll be the first time I’ve been in three years, but it’s where I go and spend time alone. I look at nature, and look at sky, and go fishing, and it’s good for my head. I’m not quite sure how it’s going to work this time. I’m expecting an enormous crash.

Clearly, you’re going to have a terrible time.

Terrible! It’s going to be awful. No, but I have just had the best job that I’ll probably ever have. I hope that’s not true. But I think it’s the best job I’ve ever done. I’ve worked for a very long time and there are peaks and troughs. But the scale of this is what makes me most proud. It’s big!

It feels game-changing in many ways, and it does open a Pandora’s box. What does this mean for live performance? What does it mean for musicians? For audiences? Could you do it with the Stones? What would it mean if you did?

Of course you could. Charlie [Watts] isn’t around, so you’re going to miss that. But yes, you could.

You couldn’t do it with Prince, for example, presumably because you can’t do the motion-capture part?

No, but you could do it. Especially with the way technology is moving. You could do it posthumously. But one of the things that is great about what we’ve been able to do is, we’ve been able to update ABBA. It’s not just nostalgia. It’s past, present and future. It’s about being able to reinvent ABBA for 2022. It’s not about recreating the 1979 Wembley concert. That wouldn’t be interesting. You can watch that on YouTube.

What about the Stones, then? Would it be desirable to do this with them?

That’s not for me to say. It’s not desirable for me. Because I think I’ve had the best band to do this with. The Stones have been on tour since year dot. They’re still on tour now. Of course, it would be exciting to see Mick in his heyday. But Mick is still so great live, at 78. Unbelievable. Not only running about the stage, but singing at the same time! I can’t walk and speak! He’s still doing it, and that’s what you want to see, with the Stones.

There are ethical concerns, too. Especially the idea of doing it with dead people.

Well, Whitney! They made a hologram of her. I didn’t see it. I saw bits of it on YouTube. But the first word that comes to mind is “grotesque.” Because that’s just a money-making exercise.

Is this going to be rolled out to other countries?

Yeah, I think so. You could do Vegas, you could do New York.

Will you be involved in those?

I hope so. This is my baby and the idea that someone else is going to take it and remodel it in some way that I found really annoying… I hope I am involved. Maybe we can add something to this that will knock people’s socks off even more? Because we do have the ability to change the show. We recorded more songs, filmed more songs. Maybe we can improve it?

One more question on the ethics of it. If a contemporary artist came to you, say Beyonce, and asked you to do the same for her as you’ve done for ABBA, to put on a virtual Beyonce concert that could play every night of the week in cities around the world, forever, and she need never leave the house again, would you? Because that idea worries people who love live music.

Yes, but I think they shouldn’t worry. Because first of all, Beyonce loves to perform. She’s not going to stop, because she is a genius performer. That’s who she is. That’s her being. And I don’t think this is going to replace anything. It’s part of the entertainment world now. But people want to see live concerts, and people still want to perform them. You think Bruce Springsteen is going to stop touring because he could do a virtual show? His life is touring. And most of those people who perform, it’s who they are. The Stones don’t want to sit at home with their feet up! They want to be on stage. They love that adoration. Who wouldn’t? 100,000 people screaming that they love you? Gimme more! So I don’t think people should be worried. They should be excited. And it’s not just music. The idea of how theatre can use this. The immersive quality of it. That thing about not knowing where the real world ends and the digital world begins. All that is really interesting. I want to see what other people do with it. I want to be excited and blown away and confused. I really look forward to seeing where it goes.

You live round the corner from here. Did you grow up in London?

I was born in London and then moved to Essex when I was young. And brought up there, all around Clacton-on-Sea, those terrible seaside towns. Working on Clacton pier, being a bingo caller, that was the start of my showbiz journey.

Do you come from a showbiz family?

No. My mum was a pharmacist, my dad was a rogue, a gambler, with all of the disaster that brings. And my mother brought up three kids on her own, pretty much. I have an older brother and a younger sister.

What kind of boy were you?

I was a rogue, too, a runaway. At the age of 14 I ran away for a month, and was in London with my friend. Can you imagine?

What were you doing?

Stealing. Shoplifting from Portobello antique shops and selling it on the Market. I was a terrible, horrible child.

Where were you living?

At the Venus Hotel on Portobello Road, with my friend’s sister. She had two children and she lived in one room in the hotel, and we lived there too. But I got caught, in the end, and put into a home, a halfway borstal. And that fixed me. I was only a couple of weeks but it scared the life out of me. And then I decided, somehow, I was going to go to art school. I was always in trouble at school, for fighting, but this teacher picked up on the fact I had some kind of talent and nurtured me, and I got into Colchester art school, doing graphics.

When was this?

I was there from 1976 to 79.

During punk.

Yeah. But I wasn’t a punk. I was more of a soul boy. It was [famous Essex soul club] Lacy Lady for me.

And after you finished art school?

Well, I didn’t want to be a graphic designer. I didn’t want to be trapped behind a desk. It wasn’t for me. Back in those days you didn’t think about a career. I just went on the adventure. I became a coin dealer, by accident.

How does a person become a coin dealer by accident?

It was when there was a gold rush on. We used to set up in hotels and buy gold and silver by weight, and the person whose business this was, was a coin dealer. I knew nothing about coins. But the great thing about it was, we travelled all over the world. And of course, I’d never travelled. I was 19, 20, and I moved to California. And I got bored of that after six months, came back to London for a holiday, and I got a job dancing with the girls at the [legendary Soho strip club] Raymond Revue Bar. Basically, erotic dancing.

Hang on. You need to explain this.

OK. So, I was staying in this really crummy flat where there was newspaper on the kitchen floor. And I saw an advert there for people willing to appear naked on stage. And I thought, “I could never do that.” So: great, you’re gonna do it. Things that are fearful, you do them. I love that. That’s the whole thing about being creative. I love to be shit-scared. So I called up and I got the job.

Did you have to audition?

You had to take all your clothes off and dance around?

The first audition was just take your clothes off and stand and pose and turn around for the choreographer, Gerard. And I later went to visit him at his flat on Charing Cross Road. And there’s this bay window that looks out onto the National Portrait Gallery, the Garrick Theatre, the neon lights, I’m 20 years old, and it’s like, “This is the best flat in the world!” And the dancer I took over from had the flat upstairs, so he moved out and I moved in, and I still live there today. I’ve been there 40 years, my whole adult life. And I think I might stay.

So the Raymond Revue Bar…

My first taste of showbiz!

It’s a load of girls getting their kit off on stage and…

Yeah, you’re a prop. You’re naked, and you have simulated sex. There’s a scene. You’d come out and pretend to play tennis, and then the music would change and suddenly it would be a sauna scene, and there’s a bench, and the lights change and you’re pretending to throw water over the girls… It was a real experience. I never got used to it. The audience are men. They want to see naked girls. They’re not happy when they see you up there.

How long did this last?

About a year? And while I was working there, I met Antony Price, at the Camden Palace. And he became my first boyfriend.

And Antony Price, for those who don’t know, was an important fashion designer…

The designer for Roxy Music. He was a real hero of mine when I was a kid. When I was 14. All those album covers, all those clothes… And because I was a dancer, Antony asked me to stage his fashion show, at the Camden Palace. So at the age of 21, I did that. At the time it was a really big deal.

Your first directing job.

Yes. I learned so much from that, and from him. His style and taste and knowledge of film and music. Just an unbelievable man.

Was that the end of your career as an erotic dancer?

Well, then I became a model. That was great. Modelling gave me the chance to try lots of things and meet lots of people. And I was successful. Modelling was a different world then. I made a living from it for a reasonable amount of time. I enjoyed it for a while, then it gets dull. It becomes a job. The glamour wears thin. And then I was getting dancing jobs as well. You know, dancing with Bananarama.

I don’t know! Tell me about dancing with Bananarama. When was that?

1987, I think. I got a call from [now famous Strictly judge] Bruno Tonioli saying, “Do you want to dance on Top of the Pops ?” So, I went, “Lifelong ambition!” So, me, Bruno, and his boyfriend then, Paul, were the backing dancers for Bananarama on Top of the Pops .

Which song?

“I Heard a Rumour.”

I’ll look it up on YouTube.

You should. [I did. The trio certainly carry off their cycling shorts.]

When does the film directing start?

At the age of 25 I saw 1900 , the Bertolucci film. And that blew my head off. I just thought, I want to do that.

What was it about that film?

Just the epic quality, the skill in the filmmaking, the beauty, the emotion, the characters, the storytelling… it had everything. Now, I’m never going to make a film like 1900 , but I started making little films with my mates. Super 8 and video cameras. And then I made one video in 1987, with [performance artist, nightclub legend, fashion icon] Leigh Bowery, who was a great mate.

You knew these people through nightclubs, that amazing scene in London in the 1980s?

Yes, exactly.

Were you a Blitz kid?

No, after that. Taboo, Leigh’s club, in Leicester Square, that was the best for me. That was the summit of my nightlife.

It’s always striking, that so many influential creative people came from that very select, underground world.

Everybody was there. [Film director] John Maybury was my boyfriend at that time. I went out with John for 17 years. I learnt a lot from him. They were amazing times.

All the most important future fashion designers and photographers and artists and filmmakers and pop stars in one room in London, dancing. It's hard to imagine this happening now…

Because of social media, I suppose. People are on their phones all the time. They don’t go out anymore. It’s one important point about the ABBA show [which insists the audience switch off their phones.] I had to really fight for that. Because otherwise they spend the whole concert filming it.

People can’t process a show, or anything else, unless they mediate it themselves.

It’s just like, “What the fuck are you doing?” It’s such madness.

You wonder what people think they are going to do with all that footage. What’s it for?

I know. Is it about ownership? “Look, I filmed this!”

So the ABBA phones policy came from that?

Yes, for all those reasons. But it was a very contentious idea. Lots of the suits, they disagree. They think that’s what everyone wants. I said, no, nobody wants that. They want to experience the show. They don’t want it ruined. The moment you put a phone up, everything’s abstract. You’re not in the moment. It’s insane. Stop!

So back to the career. You’re making a film with Leigh Bowery.

Yes, I wanted to make a pop video. So I made a track, a series of samples, called “Boys”. And Leigh is the lead in it. And Boy George saw it. This was ’87. And he asked me to make a video for him. And that was it, I was away. I made one called “After the Love”, and then “Generations of Love”, in 1990. That changed everything for me, because Massive Attack saw it. Basically it was the story of Soho, at that time. Thatcher had been in power for a long time. I was just seeing homeless people everywhere. It was really bad. So I got all my mates dressed up in drag, as prostitutes. Leigh styled it. I made a porn film, so we could project it for a scene inside one of the porn cinemas. I went and presented it at Virgin, and persuaded them. They paid the bill. And the next week I got a letter saying if you EVER show this film anywhere, we’ll sue you. But I got away with it. And it was a calling card. I still think it’s my best video. I have such fond memories of it.

And that’s what got you Massive Attack.

What a gift! To be given that album. I got the first four singles. Goosebumps, immediately, “Unfinished Sympathy” is one of my favourite songs ever, still. So beautiful. Extraordinary. And because they were the biggest band of that year, and I was associated with them, suddenly I had a career. Hate that word, career. I had the possibility of a working life, of becoming a director, I was up and running.

"Unfinished Sympathy" was such a distinctive video: one take, [the singer] Shara Nelson walking through Downtown LA, apparently oblivious to everything around her. And that’s it.

It hadn’t been done before. I wanted to challenge myself, I wanted to be scared. “Can I do this?”

It’s the antithesis of one of those videos that’s all about trying to sell the image of the star, the band.

But the song gave me this. That thing of when you are really hurt, and you are walking down the street and you are completely and utterly within yourself. You are not noticing anything that’s going on around you. We’ve all been there, right? Just destroyed by love. I wanted it to be that unbroken thought. This inner voice. That came from the music. But at the same time I was very aware that I was going against the tide, which I knew was a really good idea. Always a good idea. Because every [other] video at the time, it was [director] David Fincher, and it was all about fast-cuts.

His stuff with Madonna?

Yeah, it was all fast cuts. Make it as bright and shiny and fast-cutty as you can. And I’m sorry but “Vogue” is a fucking genius video. And David Fincher did it very well. But we went against the grain, made it really gritty. And Massive Attack’s music always smelt American to me. It sounded so big, so epic. I really wanted an international visual language for them. Take it away from Bristol, from the UK. So Downtown LA. In fact, the first video I did for them was “Daydreaming”, which I set in the Deep South. But yes, opportunities were coming thick and fast at that time.

You were very successful for a while.

Yeah. I only made thirteen videos. And then the world changed, budgets shrank, the demands from the record companies grew. And I thought, if you want me to basically make advertising, I’ll go off and make a ton of money doing that.

Which is what you did.

It’s what I did. I don’t say I made a ton of money but I earned a living. And the great thing about advertising, as nasty as it can be, is that you get to hone your craft. You’re filming, you’re on a set, you’re working with people. That’s really important, because making films is next to impossible, right? I’ve never been lucky at that.

Was it always in your mind, throughout the Eighties and the Nineties and beyond, to make a feature film?

Always. Always to make movies. And I wrote many and nearly got them made and spent years trying, as you do with films.

And, finally, you got there, with Flashbacks of a Fool .

Yes. And there were really good things about that and really bad things about that. The great thing was, I wrote that for Daniel Craig before he was Bond, right? We’re mates. And he still wanted to make it after he became Bond, which was wonderful. Because that meant all the effort that I’d made when I tried to get it made before he was Bond, and failed, had not been wasted. When he became Bond that gave him enormous power. He could get anything made. And he was generous enough to sprinkle some of that glitter on to me, and to allow me to make that film. The trouble with that is, that this small art film is then sold as a Bond film. Which is a disaster. Because if you deceive an audience, they don’t like it. You can’t sell candyfloss as popcorn. People want to know what they’re buying, so when it’s released as a fucking Bond film, and it’s a small little art film that should be in two cinemas and possibly grow from there, it’s a disaster. And critics don’t like it, either. No one likes it. I still have a fondness for Flashbacks , but I was really hurt by the response to it. When you put that much heart and soul into something, and you have a joyous time making it, and it’s received with a shrug of the shoulders and a “whatever”, it’s tough. The opposite to what the ABBA thing has been. This is all five stars. Every review. I’ll never have reviews like this again. But the reviews for Flashbacks knocked me, they knocked my confidence. I doubted myself. I felt misunderstood. It was really, really annoying. “No one understands me!”

How did you recover from that?

Well, cut to two years later, someone sends me a link to Flashbacks on YouTube and I read the reviews on there. It blew me away. Floods of tears. Because what I wanted, it did happen, people did get it. So I’m not saying the film is a success, or good. But the response I wanted did happen, and that was a beautiful thing. So I’m really fond of the film. I know it’s flawed but I think there are great moments in it, and I learnt from it. I would love the opportunity to make another feature film. I still have that ambition. Even though film now, somehow, has really lost its lustre. It’s really shocking.

Why is that?

The demise of Weinstein, I think. It died with Weinstein. It was dying anyway, but that finished it off. Because when he was at his pinnacle, the monster that he was, but how fucking great were the films? And the stars! Now, apart from Tom Cruise, there are no movie stars left.

The independent film scene in the Nineties and Noughties was rocking.

It was so exciting. And it’s gone. It’s such a tragedy, obviously, that Harvey was such a monster. Not only for the obvious reasons, for the people affected by his behaviour, which is a tragedy. But also for cinema. Now, the world’s a different place. That was the zeitgeist, that was the time. And now cinema is not nearly as interesting as it was. So yes, I do want to make films, but the idea of making an arthouse movie and going to Poland to show it at a fucking festival, is not interesting. I want people to see it!

What about TV, where all the action is? Is that appealing?

Yeah, I have a TV series I’d love to make. It’s called Pussycat Lounge, based on my year at the Raymond Revue Bar. Set in that period. [Production company] Tiger Aspect had it. That didn’t go very well. Got it back from them. And right now no one is interested. I think that because I do so many different things, it’s kind of hard to place me.

You’re a victim of your own versatility?

Maybe. I always try to treat everything I do with the same enthusiasm. I don’t think there’s a difference between all these things [videos, and films, and shows]. But people in Hollywood don’t think like that. They want you to repeat everything. We all know that.

They would rather you did another ABBA Voyage than made a TV show.

Exactly. Although having said that, I do love putting on a live show, seeing people’s reactions, having an adoring crowd. And it also seems to me that this golden age of TV is coming to an end, too. Five years ago, every director wanted a TV show. Now it feels like that’s dying. There’s too much stuff, right? I’m just overwhelmed when I go on to Netflix. That was the great thing about growing up in my period: you had to wait for the single to come out. You had to wait for Top of the Pops on Thursday, to see that performance. Now we’re just fucking overwhelmed.

Not least by social media. We’re all on our phones.

I think social media is a terrible thing, I don’t do any of it. It’s just noise. I think it’s the least creative thing ever. And if I was on it, because I’m obsessive, I would want to do it well, and that’s a full-time job. It’s all-consuming. I wouldn’t have made [the ABBA] show if I was on social media. I wouldn’t have had time!

Also, don’t know about you but I have never been moved by a post on Instagram. I have never been enlightened by a Tweet. These aren’t media where we can really connect deeply with other people.

No! It’s impossible. I’m suspicious of all posts. They all have a motive. They aren’t gifts. They’re not about anything but the person who sends them. It’s all about you . And, actually, fuck off!

A lot of stuff seems to be dying. I saw Glastonbury on TV. It was Noel Gallagher, Paul McCartney…

And Diana Ross! Fucking geriatric. Torture, it was torture! Although I had to watch the Pet Shop Boys, because I know them. And you know what? They were fucking great. Like, “OK! Now we’re cooking!”

The risk is, we end up sounding like a grumpy old men.

But I am! And it’s hard to be excited about anything when there’s too much stuff.

Which brings us back to the ABBA show.

It’s exciting because it doesn’t feel like anything else. It’s different. It’s a miracle! Seeing the joy drip off the walls of that arena, it’s unbelievable.

So what’s next?

A holiday. And because I’ve thought of nothing else for three years other than ABBA, I need to take a breath, and be quiet, and think. Like I was saying, I’ve been really spoilt, with this project. What’s next? The thing is, in a way it’s not for me to say. All these opportunities that have come my way, people have given them to me. A lot of them, I haven’t gone searching for them. So what’s next is, wait for the next job to be offered.

That sounds both admirably zen, and also a little terrifying. What if nothing comes along?

Something always has. Alex, I’ve done this for 30 years or more. There are times when I’m really popular, and times when I can’t get arrested. That can go on for years. There have been times when I haven’t worked at all for two years. Because I couldn’t get a job. But that’s the nature of my business. You’re in and out of fashion. You do something that gets lots of attention and you’ll get work for a couple of years, maybe. And then it stops again. You do the best you can. You might do quiet work for a bit. A commercial that’s only shown in China. To earn a living. And you wait for an opportunity.

For a couple of weeks, I’ve got opportunities.

And you’re going to disappear to Iceland?!

They know where to find me. But, no, the ABBA show is going to roll out all over the world, right? That’ll give me some longevity. And by that point I’ll be dead anyway. So, I’m not fretting.

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ABBA’s Live ‘Voyage’ Show Is Doing Big Numbers in London: ‘We’ve Sold 380,000 Tickets,’ Benny Andersson Reveals

By Fred Bronson

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The first news about a virtual ABBA show broke in 2016. Six years later, “Voyage” is set to open at the purpose-built 3,000-seat ABBA Arena in London’s Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park. Along the way, Benny Andersson and Björn Ulvaeus wrote two new songs for the show and reunited with Agnetha Fältskog and Anni-Frid (Frida) Lyngstad to record a new album, making a spectacular comeback for the Swedish quartet that first achieved international fame in 1974 by winning the Eurovision Song Contest with “Waterloo.”

After two previews, a VIP invited audience will see the show tonight (Thursday, May 26) and an official opening night happens on Friday, May 27. Fans from all over the world will finally be able to see this one-of-a-kind show featuring technology that has never been seen before. From a production office backstage at the arena, Andersson spoke with Variety via Zoom about the highly-anticipated production.

After a six-year journey, you finally saw the complete finished production of “Voyage” for the first time just six weeks ago. What were your thoughts on this initial viewing?

Popular on Variety

I thought that everyone who has been working on this project has done a fantastic job. That’s what I felt. It is us up there. It’s ABBA, and so beautifully done. To me, the only question that really mattered was not if it is good enough but how will the audience react when we’re not really there, you know? Will they look at it as a painting? Would you applaud a painting? Would you applaud a movie? You don’t do that. Would they be immersed in what we’re trying to achieve here? The first audience came in on Friday and that was only half-full. They wanted to check the premises, check the bars and see that everything was hunky-dory. The audience was fantastic and the preview we had the day before yesterday was a full house. Yes, an incredible reaction. We were there, I promise you. We were actually there. So I’m very happy.

Fans are wondering if it will be emotional seeing your avatars on stage, since beyond this opening week you will not be present during the show. Did you feel emotional watching the production?

To see the audience, yes. To see ourselves, not much. Because I know what’s going on. The good thing is that we, ABBA, will be equally good or bad every night.

Is it fair to say that this technologically-advanced show is the first of its kind?

Yes, it is, which is why we were turned on by it. We thought, wow, can we really do this? It was good that we had some stamina, because there’s been some uphill [battles] during these five and a half years. We said, “Well, we’ve started it. We need to go through with it and it has to happen.” Everything, from ILM’s work to the lighting to the sound is amazingly beautiful. It’s the best sound you’ve heard in an arena ever, I promise you that. That has been my department. I mean, the music is my department, the band sound. All the people who work with this have been wonderful. But the technique has nothing to do with the show. You sit there and you see a band on stage and that’s what it is.

Almost four decades after the four of you last recorded together, you’re debuting two new songs for the show, “I Still Have Faith In You” and “Don’t Shut Me Down.” Whose idea was it? 

That was me. I talked to Björn. I said, if we would have been doing this for real, going out on the stage, we would have added a couple of new songs to perform. And then I called the ladies and they said yes. That surprised me a lot. I think they saw the whole picture, that it would be good for ABBA “Voyage” the concert if we had some new music out there. So we did that and I thought with the first two songs, it went so well and they could still sing and we could still produce music in the studio so we said maybe we’ll do a couple of others while we’re at it, and we ended up doing a whole album.

I understand it went from two songs to five songs to 10 songs.

And then 10. That’s right. We recorded 12 songs and we didn’t finish two of them. No, we said, let’s work on the ones we think we should keep on the album. But this is it. No more.

Björn and Agnetha have publicly said there will be no more ABBA. And now you are saying that, too. No more recordings? Ever?

It’s never say never, but it’s a no. Nothing is going to happen after this.

I thought with the success of the “Voyage” album around the world, you might want to do more.

Yes, it did well. But no.

There is a playlist on Spotify called “Abba A to Z” with every song you have recorded in alphabetical order. It lasts for eight hours. How did you narrow down the vast ABBA catalog to fill the concert’s running time of 90 minutes?

We spent a lot of time on this. We realized we cannot not play [the hits] but we also wanted to give the concert some dynamics, so there are a few songs that the audience will not be too familiar with, but we like them so we put them in. It’s 21 songs and it feels good.

With this new technology, can you change the set list at some point in the future without going back into the motion-capture suits?

Yes. ILM [ Industrial Light and Magic ] has all the information from us in numbers, so we can bring our body doubles back in. They can do the work if we wanted to swap a couple of songs in a year’s time or so and work on it and it’ll be exactly the same. We don’t have to go back ourselves into the studio again. That’s what they have promised us.

There are eight other songs on the “Voyage” album that are not in the show, so you could possibly add them in a year or two from now.

Maybe. I’m fond of “Ode to Freedom.”

The album was a very bright spot in two very dark years. What did the success of the album mean to you? Were you concerned at all how it would do?

I wasn’t worried. You do the best that you can and you hope for the best. I think it’s the first time we’ve had really good reviews all over.

The album peaked at No. 2 on the Billboard chart, the highest ranking of your career in the U.S., and was No. 1 in many countries.

Not bad. So we were happy, of course. But I have to say that it actually was to enthuse people to come to this show.

In 1999, when rehearsals were going on in London for “Mamma Mia!” the stage musical, Björn told me he had no idea if the show was going to be a hit. Did you have the same thoughts about “Voyage”?

It’s the same thing with “Mamma Mia!” or any show, anything that you’re working on. You have your previews and you have all your rehearsals and all that and you can say, “This is as good as we can do it,” and you don’t know if it’s a hit or if it’s a flop until the audience comes in. They give you that. The first time with the audience will tell you everything. It did for “Mamma Mia!” absolutely.

A lot of people are still saying they are going to see holograms on stage, but that is not true. How would you describe the technology?

This has been an impossible task. The only way to explain it is you have to go and see it. Because we are digitally produced and we are actually on stage. We’re not on a screen. Well, we are on a screen but you can’t see that and I don’t know how they’ve done it because it’s so beautiful. It’s amazing. The work they’ve done at ILM and our producers and Baillie Walsh, the director. Yes, it’s real. You’re going to see it when you come. It’s really real and I don’t get it. I’m just happy that we achieved what we set out to do and finally we’re in the starting boxes.

The ABBA Arena was buiIt specifically to house this show and its unique technology. Yet, I’ve read they might tear down the building in four years.

If it runs until Christmas, I’m happy.

Maybe longer?

I’ll be even happier. The plan is for the city to build housing in this place, so we have about four years, four and a half or whatever, but if I were the mayor of London, I’d keep this arena because it’s beautiful. There’s nothing of the kind in London, no 3000-seaters. I would keep it, put some [other show] out there or let us run if we can.

It’s already been suggested that the next city to host “Voyage” will be Las Vegas.

We’ll see. This has to get on its feet first. We have to see how attractive it is. We’ve sold 380,000 tickets or so. It’s good for a couple months. We need to see if it sells more tickets. But there will be promoters coming in from the U.S. to see if there’s something that will be suitable for their market. I think we’re exactly in the right spot here in London. The English people have always treated us like we were theirs for some odd reason, for which I’m very humbly grateful.

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Inside the production of ABBA’s holographic pop residency

By Guy Campos in Live Events , Production , UK&I May 31, 2022 0

The Swedish pop royalty spent five weeks in a motion-capture studio operated by George Lucas’ company Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) to produce their ABBA-tars

Swedish pop royalty ABBA spent five weeks in a film studio wearing figure-hugging motion capture suits during the development of a London holographic concert residency which opened last week.

The performers worked with George Lucas’ special effects company Industrial Light & Magic (ILM), which is known for its work on movies such as  Star Wars and Lord of the Rings.

Some 160 cameras scanned their bodies, recording every movement and facial expression, to develop the avatars which drive the live show. Body doubles were also used to give the ageing band members, now in their seventies, more youthful movements.

#ABBAVoyage , a concert like no other, is finally here! pic.twitter.com/EUfxMKIDIn — ABBA Voyage (@ABBAVoyage) May 27, 2022

According to a detailed profile of the production process in Billboard magazine , m ore than 1,000 visual-effects artists and one billion computing hours went into the making of the performers' "ABBA-tars". These ABBA-tars appear on huge 65-million-pixel screens, pictured life size on stage and in photo-realistic close-ups.

The ABBA Voyage show takes place in a purpose-built, 3,000-capacity ABBA Arena in East London, that uses 20 lighting rigs and more than 500 moving lights. The venue houses 291 speakers and has LED lights spelling out the band's name on its outer skin. It also provides space for a ten-piece live band which accompanies the recordings of Agnetha and Frida’s voices, Bjorn’s guitar and Benny’s piano.

Last week's premiere of the show was attended by all four ABBA musicians together with King Carl XVI Gustaf and Queen Silvia of Sweden and celebrities including Kylie Minogue, Zara Larsson, Jarvis Cocker, Kate Moss and Keira Knightley.

According to Billboard magazine, the magic of the otherwise stunning premiere show was broken only fleetingly when the avatars addressed the audience and their pre-recorded words were drowned out by the crowd, with no delay taking place to milk the applause of the audience as would happen with live pop stars.

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ABBA Voyage: How does it work?

Best of 2022: ABBA's reappearance on stage has garnered rave reviews. But how exactly do you convincingly put on a gig from a band that isn't there?

Join us for our traditional look back at the stories and features that hit the spot in 2022

Best of 2022 : It’s incredible but true. ABBA's return to ‘live’ performance has been deemed a huge success by early critics and the whole unlikely (and costly, and years in the making) venture looks like it will be a success.

Just to stress at this point, the world of live shows and musical theatre is anything but a sure thing. High-profile productions are fraught with danger and for every smash hit that just ‘runs and runs’ there are many more costly and embarrassing failures . 

But ABBA’s team appear to have done the impossible - created a hi-tech ‘virtual show’ that pleases crowds but doesn’t actually feature the band themselves, and which has attracted raves from critics and early audiences alike.

And with ABBA not even in the building during the performance – apart from the debut press performance of course – it’s quite possible that this show could run for years. Decades… centuries even… long after the real artists have left us, setting a precedent for countless ‘virtual’ shows to come from artists both currently living and long since departed.

Does your mother know?

So how did they do it? Well, it’s very clever but at its heart pretty simple.

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Yes, there’s all the donning of ‘mocap’ suits to ensure that the virtual band moves like the real thing; yes, there’s all the thousands of hours animating realistic computer graphic ABBAtars etc. However, the real magic of ABBA Voyage is all about bringing it all into your eyes and ears to convince you that this is a real, live gig happening in front of you.

ABBA Voyage’s big ‘trick’ takes advantage of one of the unfortunate traits of today’s big gigs. No, not poor parking and overpriced hot dogs - we're talking about the fact that nobody actually looks at the tiny obscured figure on the stage, but instead spends the gig watching the huge jumbotron screens either side of it.

The smartest bit of the production – ABBA ‘actually on stage’ (which we’ll come to later) – is actually the one thing you’re most likely not looking at.

Thus – just like a real gig – for 90% of the time you're watching a pre-rendered Avatar-quality animated movie on huge screens in front of you. And off to the side. And behind the stage too.

But what of that centre stage?

You might not know it (yet) but most of today’s big productions for movie and TV take advantage of a technique known as virtual production. This next-level movie magic not only looks better than ‘traditional’ green screening but is faster and easier too. And it’s disappointingly simple to pull off: you basically erect a huge LED screen and project a background onto it while your actors act in front of it. Then you film the lot in the same way that they’ve been making movies for a hundred plus years.

No messing about ‘cutting people out’ and placing them in amongst computer graphics... Just pre-render the whole background in Unreal Engine 5 (the go-to option for videogame graphics) and get your guys to act in front of it.

And – bonus – because the results are ‘in camera’ a little bit of movie magic happens. The results look like the actor is really there, with the background (even if the background is being played from a computer). Your brain no longer needs to glue two things together. They’re there. Already. For real.

ABBA’s Voyage takes this tech to the live arena. And, in the controlled environment of a pitch black, locked down arena tailor made for the event itself, it’s a fairly easy trick to pull off. You’re not looking at a stage. You’re looking at hundreds of square feet of LED walls.

I have a dream

The hardest bit is faking the band ‘on stage’ and it’s here that the show’s makers get away with it… but only just. 

On the screens to the side of the arena the members of ABBA are in full 3D. Cameras sweep past them. They can turn, pass in front of each other, have fully formed sides, backs, tops and [cough] bottoms. But on stage they are a flat 2D image on a 65-million pixel giant LCD.

So the stage is wreathed in real spotlights and strobes but the lighting hitting the figures on stage – perfectly in sync with the real world photon bombardment around them – is simply part of the animation that’s being projected there.

It all looks so real, but would prove flat as a pancake if you were to get up close. Be under no illusion. These aren’t even hi-tech holograms (a tech still very much in its infancy and yet to blast off in any kind of convincing form).

But if ABBA aren’t really there, why not simply have a backing track supply the music too? Perhaps this is the most clever bit. The genius use of real live music helps blur the perception even further.

Thank you for the music

ABBA Voyage’s music is delivered by a live band of ten musicians currently deploying the services of ex-Klaxon turned indie popstar James Righton and on keyboards Victoria Hesketh, better known as electro pop’s Little Boots . 

We say ‘currently’ as – if this show runs for years to come (and there’s absolutely no technical, spiritual or physical reason for it not to) – like ABBA themselves, they might not fancy banging out Dancing Queen in their 70s.

The band are there on stage, off to one side, for perspective, and being as real and as live as any gig you’ve ever seen and this use of thus wobbly old real, live music – albeit tightly playing to strict backing tracks in lockstep with the graphics and lighting exploding all around the arena – just goes that extra step to blurring the edges of the experience.

It sounds live. It looks live. It’s… live? Yes, it is, really. Really good, real music, being played for real on a real stage with really accurately modelled 3D versions of real people. But from then on in, it’s all smoke, mirrors and giant LEDs.

Daniel Griffiths is a veteran journalist who has worked on some of the biggest entertainment, tech and home brands in the world. He's interviewed countless big names, and covered countless new releases in the fields of music, videogames, movies, tech, gadgets, home improvement, self build, interiors and garden design. He’s the ex-Editor of Future Music and ex-Group Editor-in-Chief of Electronic Musician, Guitarist, Guitar World, Computer Music and more. He renovates property and writes for MusicRadar.com.

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ABBA Voyage

It’s been a while since we made music together. Almost 40 years, actually. We took a break in the spring of 1982 and now we’ve decided it’s time to end it. They say it’s foolhardy to wait more than 40 years between albums, so we’ve recorded a follow-up to “The Visitors”. To tell the truth, the main inspiration to record again comes from our involvement in creating the strangest and most spectacular concert you could ever dream of. We’re going to be able to sit back in an audience and watch our digital selves perform our songs on a stage in a custom-built arena in London next spring. Weird and wonderful!

To all of you who patiently have followed us in some way or another these past decades:

Thank you for waiting – it’s time for a new journey to begin.

“We simply call it “Voyage” and we’re truly sailing in uncharted waters. With the help of our younger selves, we travel into the future. It’s not easy to explain but then it hasn’t been done before.”

“It’s hard to say what’s been the most joyful thing for me ( Benny ) with this project. If it’s the involvement in creating the concert together with everyone or being back in the studio together again after 40 years. I think hearing Frida and Agnetha singing again is hard to beat. When you come to the arena you will have the four of us together with an absolutely glorious 10-piece band. And even if not in the flesh, we will be right there, thanks to the work of the creative team and ILM.”

“Those first sessions back in 2018 were such fun and when Benny called and asked if I’d ( Anni-Frid ) consider singing some more I jumped at it! And what songs!! My respect and love go out to these exceptionally talented, truly genius songwriters! Such joy it was to work with the group again. I am so happy with what we have made, and I dearly hope our fans feel the same.”

“When we got back together in the studio I ( Agnetha) had no idea what to expect…But Benny’s recording studio is such a friendly and safe environment, and before I knew it I was really enjoying myself! I can hardly believe that finally, the moment has come to share this with the world!”

“They’re such amazing singers those two, I ( Björn) was completely floored by the way they delivered those songs. They’re true musicians; totally unimpressed by pop star glamour but still having a great time being creative in a recording studio. The “Voyage” project has injected new life into us in more ways than one.”

“So, again, thanks for waiting! We hope to see you in the “ABBA Arena” and yes – see – because we have infused a good deal of our souls into those avatars. It’s not an exaggeration to say that we’re back.”

Agnetha, Björn, Benny, Anni-Frid

Stockholm, Sweden, 2nd September 2021

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ABBA Voyage review: Camp, fun and low-energy… and not just because they’re holograms

George lucas’s production company have created digital versions of a younger abba that look scarily real, article bookmarked.

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Do you know what’s comforting? ABBA can open a multi-million-pound stage show full of fancy tech. They can create a purpose-built stadium. They can return to the stage as state-of-the-art avatar versions of their younger selves. And yet people will still respond as though they’re 12 gins deep at a wedding disco. On Thursday night, as the opening bars of each song began – the setlist had remained a surprise – all around me are elated cries of “OH! OHHH!!!” This, by the way, is a compliment. ABBA do something to people.

This is not to downplay what a ground-breaking venture this is. There’s a band of 10, a 20-song setlist, and strobes, beads, and domes of light submerge the crowd. It’s an incredible spectacle. Everything has clearly been done, at great expense, to inspire awe – so much so that it’s sometimes hard to know where to look. But what of the ABBAtars? Industrial Light & Magic, George Lucas’s production company, have created digital versions of a younger ABBA that look scarily real. When projected on bigger screens, they do admittedly have a touch of the video game character about them. My brain got a bit preoccupied with whether it could really be tricked into thinking I was at an ABBA concert. My conclusion: it’s better to think of this as an incredibly premium piece of theatre. It still looks like… the future.

The set-list is mostly crowd-pleasing: “Dancing Queen”, “SOS” and “Waterloo” are all here, with a restrained number of songs from the new album. The naff costumes have had a glow up from Dolce & Gabbana, and choreographer Wayne McGregor has helped to recreate the band’s original moves, which are endearingly low-energy. ABBA’s stage presence is docile, and I don’t think it’s just because they are holograms.

There are brief stretches of languor when the holograms disappear and a baffling anime film is played. Why did the holograms go away, I wonder – do they get tired? I suddenly start thinking about Klara and the Sun , Kazuo Ishiguro’s novel about robots who might have a soul. I decide it’s best not to think about it too much.

There are strangely intimate moments when each ABBAtar appears alone to talk to the crowd. In their younger bodies, they speak in their older voices – Anni-Frid paying tribute to her grandmother, Agnetha thanking fans for the years of support. It’s a reminder that this isn’t just a great technological leap, but something deeply personal for these four individuals. ABBA Voyage preserves their achievement as the world’s greatest pop band forever, and fans will be able to take leave of their senses to the chorus of “Gimme Gimme Gimme” for as long as they still want to.

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There is one specific moment that wins me over. I’m past the point of no return. The ABBAtars make a joke about a quick costume change, then re-emerge in velour jumpsuits, emblazoned with their own names in diamante (these would make a killing if sold in the shop) and perform “Mamma Mia”, complete with deeply uncool dance moves. It is camp. It is knowing. It is ludicrously fun.

If I have a reservation, it’s that the show lacks emotional connection. After all, the ABBAtars don’t know we’re clapping or singing along; they can’t respond to the man who is practically keening at the end, yelling “More! Mooore!!” But, actually, it isn’t about that. The real alchemy here is happening all around you. It’s a concert where everyone knows the words to every song. It’s a gig where the person sat next to you is going to become your best friend. It’s a haven for endorphins, a safe space for people who want to dance badly and enthusiastically, and sing “Chiquita” at the top of their lungs. I am among my people.

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Studio Wayne McGregor

ABBA Voyage

ABBA Voyage 2022 Company ABBA Producers Svana Gisla and Ludvig Andersson Director Baillie Walsh Co-Executive Producer Johan Renck Motion Capture Industrial Light & Magic Choreography Wayne McGregor Premiere date and venue 27 May 2022, ABBA Arena, London, UK Dates

✮✮✮✮✮ 'A MEETING OF TECHNOLOGICAL MARVEL AND MUSICAL MAGIC... ABBA VOYAGE IS A FEAT OF TECHNOLOGICAL EXCELLENCE'

Mickey Jo Boucher - What's On Stage

Blurring the lines between the physical and digital, the magic of ABBA is brought to life using the latest in motion capture technology in ABBA Voyage . ABBA Voyage is a revolutionary concert from one of the biggest pop acts of all time featuring a setlist of ABBA’s biggest, most popular hits – each handpicked with great care by the band. Agnetha, Björn, Benny and Anni-Frid created the kind of concert they always wanted, performing for their fans at their very best: as digital versions of themselves backed by today’s finest musicians, choreographed by Wayne McGregor. "Imagine: growing up in the North of England in the 70’s and learning to ballroom, Latin and disco dance to the incredible songs of ABBA. I was 8 and I was totally transported. Fast forward to 2020, being in Sweden and dancing with ABBA — in real life! I was about to be 50 and I was totally transported again. That is the magic of ABBA. We have shared many creative and joyful adventures with a bold collaborative team to make the impossible possible for ABBA Voyage: technological wizardry, state of the art immersion and entertainment innovation. And still at its searing heart we simply have new songs, new moves, classic songs, classic moves: ABBA is DANCE and always will be. See you on the dancefloor!” — Wayne McGregor The digital versions of ABBA were created following weeks and months of motion-capture and performance techniques with the four band members and an 850-strong team from Industrial Light & Magic, the company founded by George Lucas. Images: Baillie Walsh / courtesy of ABBA Voyage.

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Abba Voyage Review: No Ordinary Abba Night at the Club

With a concert spectacle mixing wizardry and technical skill, the band makes a case for its continued relevance.

By Juan A. Ramírez

LONDON — I kept turning to my friend, wanting to tell him how young and fresh the two women that put the As in Abba seemed on the giant screens ahead of us. Agnetha Faltskog and Anni-Frid Lyngstad were not actually in the room with us, but that’s the kind of stupor Abba Voyage dazzles you into.

Though the Swedish pop band has not played London since 1979, holographic “Abbatars” of the band, modeled in their likeness from that year, are currently filling up a custom-built arena for a 90-minute concert of their greatest hits. A combination of motion-captured performance, animated sequences and a live 10-person band make up the spectacle, which makes a floor-thumping case for the music’s continued relevance.

Projected on a screen that envelops one side of the spaceshiplike auditorium, the Abbatars play mostly as if it were a real concert. They “enter” from below the stage, make banter with the audience, ask for patience as they switch costumes, and return for an encore.

It would feel corny if it weren’t so triumphantly fun, and the Friday night crowd was certainly along for the ride. Largely a mix of couples in their mid 60s and younger, disco-leaning gay men, the attendees sang through every number with the intensity of a therapeutic ritual. Abba Voyage is an exercise in symbol worship that separates itself from an ordinary Abba night at the club through state-of-the-art production values.

“To be or not to be — that is no longer the question,” the band member Benny Andersson declares in a prerecorded solo address, and questions about live performance, truth, eternity and transience are frothed up into the sheer giddiness of (almost) being in the same room as one of the biggest acts in pop music history.

It’s hard to pin down the reasons that such a strange, 21st century endeavor is a crowd-pleasing success, but Abba’s music has its own strange alchemy. Take “Mamma Mia” (performed here in rhinestone-emblazoned pink velour jumpsuits): Why is the hook an Italian catchphrase? Or “Fernando” (sung against a dramatic lunar eclipse): What could these four Swedes possibly have to say about the Mexican revolution? And yet, something about the earnestness of those songs, reflected in the audience’s full-chested belting, has made them inescapable pop standards.

Those two songs are performed straightforwardly, the Abbatars life-size and center stage, with surrounding screens projecting close-ups for those seated in the orchestra level, behind a massive dance floor. Most of the numbers are done this way, recreating a concert experience; the audience was overjoyed to dance along and applaud each step of the way. Choreography, based on the band member’s real movements, but captured from younger body doubles, hit its peak during “Gimme! Gimme! Gimme!,” with the digital Lyngstad doing high-kicks and twirls that I’m not sure the real one was capable of in her heyday.

A couple of songs, however, played more like immersive music videos, with the full size of the screens used to tell more thorough visual stories. The band famously sang and performed through its own breakup, and “Knowing Me, Knowing You,” a 1977 anthem mirroring the dissolution of romantic and professional relations in the group, is here performed as an Ingmar Bergman-esque study in missed connections. Its members’ fractured faces sing across a hall of mirrors before ultimately embracing in reconciliation.

Less successful than those episodes were two fully-animated numbers, set to “Eagle” and “Voulez Vous,” following a young traveler’s journey through forests and pyramids, and culminating in their discovery of giant sculptures of the band member’s heads.

Those songs recreate the interstitial bits of a “real” concert, as do speeches from each Abbatar about their success and artistry. The best of these interludes saw the band present the footage from their Eurovision Song Contest-winning performance of “Waterloo,” the song that catapulted them to fame in 1974.

Abba’s music is deceptively complex. What sounds like a simple little song reveals itself to be an intricately layered web of harmonies, melodies, real and digital instruments and angelic English vocals, ever-so-slightly outside the band’s Scandinavian comfort zone.

It’s a mix of wizardry and technical skill that, decades later, after movies and musicals and greatest hits compilations, is still at the pinnacle of pop maximalism. To hear the closing piano riffs on “Chiquitita” in a crowded arena is an exalting experience, and despite its eyebrow-raising premise, Abba Voyage miraculously takes flight.

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ABBA Voyage

45+ years | 500+ film and tv credits | 135+ awards.

ABBA Voyage is a revolutionary new concert that will see ABBA: Agnetha, Bjorn, Benny, and Anni-Frid, performing digitally with a live 10-piece band in a purpose-built 3,000 capacity arena at Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in London from 27th May 2022.

ILM’s work on ABBA Voyage in creating the digital versions of ABBA has been overseen by Creative Director Ben Morris.

Let’s work together

5 studios. One imaginative brain trust.

Industrial Light & Magic, ILM, The Bulb And Gear Design Logo, StageCraft and TechnoProps are all service marks of Lucasfilm Ltd. © & ™ Lucasfilm Ltd. All rights reserved.

We earn a commission for products purchased through some links in this article.

How to get ABBA Voyage tickets as booking extended to January 2025

Voulez-vous?

ABBA Voyage location – what's the story with the ABBA Arena?

Why should i see abba voyage, abba voyage merch and gifts.

ABBA 's groundbreaking virtual concert experience ABBA Voyage is now booking into next year, after opening to glowing reviews in spring 2022.

Agnetha, Björn, Benny and Frida last performed together in 1982, and this show sees the Eurovision winners and international pop icons recreated in digital 'ABBAtar' form.

Created in partnership with groundbreaking TV and film effects experts Industrial Light & Magic, these figures are the stars of a virtual experience in a real-life concert hall located in London that's been designed especially for the occasion.

As well as all the classics you probably know inside out, the concert also features the band's first new material in several decades, taken from their 2021 album Voyage .

With booking now open for future shows until January 2025, here's how you can see the show.

ABBA Voyage tickets – when is the concert running to, plus start time and running times

ABBA Voyage is now booking until January 5, 2025 , having been extended again from its previous endpoint in late November 2024. The official ABBA Voyage website has the most up-to-date availability information, with a clickable calendar and traffic light system to show ticket availability .

ABBA Voyage shows usually take place on Mondays, Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays. There are no performances listed for Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, Boxing Day or New Year's Eve in 2024, and the ABBA Arena will also be closed on January 1, 2025.

A 1pm matinee has been added on Monday, May 27 with good availability, if you're looking to go soon.

According to the New York Times , planning permission for the ABBA Arena is set to expire in April 2026, with reports suggesting that area of the Olympic Park will then be designated for housing.

Tickets for ABBA Voyage are also available via Ticketmaster . Resale is strictly prohibited although Ticketmaster now operates a verified fan-to-fan ticket exchange system – more details on which are available here .

Meanwhile, other retailers such as Get Your Guide offer a combined package with prices starting from £55.

This includes your ticket (with priority entrance to the venue), and a return coach ticket to London's Victoria coach station on a specially-branded ABBA Voyage electric bus. (If you're travelling from outside of London, you'll need to arrange your own travel to Victoria coach station.)

Access tickets are available to book online via the official ABBA Voyage website, with dedicated email addresses for any related queries. All ticketing is digital, although you can purchase a souvenir printed ticket for an extra fee which will be mailed to you after the show.

The arena features seating, and a standing space (called the Dance Floor, obviously). The seating also includes Dance Booths, which can be booked for groups.

Related: Mamma Mia 3 potential release date, songs, cast and everything you need to know

Show times are noted on the official ABBA Voyage website , although it's advised that you check your tickets for the correct performance start time.

We'd also recommend leaving a good amount of time to pass through security checks and ticket scanning on entry. The concert running time is 90 minutes straight through – so no interval.

As for the setlist? Well, no spoilers here – but it's highly likely that you'll be able to experience at least one of your favourite tracks from the ABBA back catalogue, if not more…

The purpose-built, hexagonal ABBA Arena seats 1,650 people, and has standing room for 1,350. According to industry journal Building , it's been "designed as a demountable temporary venue", which means there's the option to dismantle it, relocate it and reassemble it with relative ease.

The arena space has been designed in a way to enable it to be column-free, with a 65-million-pixel screen that wraps around the audience.

The ABBA Arena is located in the Olympic Park in Stratford, east London, right next to Pudding Mill Lane DLR station. There are also 10 parking spaces for blue badge holders which can be reserved in advance via email , and around 100 places to park bicycles near the arena gates.

The arena has step-free entry and as mentioned above, there are access and step-free seating options available once you get inside.

The Guardian , NME , Variety and the Evening Standard were all united in praise for the concert, so let's just say the reviews speak for themselves.

Having been among The Visitors to the show (sorry, we'll show ourselves out), you do need to be prepared to suspend your disbelief to fully immerse yourself in all of ABBA Voyage's visual and sound trickery – but if you do, then you can expect a memorable experience. Pulp frontman Jarvis Cocker's description of the concert leaving him in "a state of confusion", as quoted in the New York Times , is somewhat relatable.

Without giving too much away (we don't want to spoil too many surprises after all), while everyone's talking about the visuals – from stunning light fittings to elaborate costumes for the so-called 'ABBAtars' which, per Vogue , were actually made in real life – the sound quality in the arena is simply great. The original recordings of ABBA are complimented by a sensational live band, who also get their moments to shine.

Also, one surprise that's out there in the open thanks to the official ABBA Voyage social media channels – if you're really, really, really lucky, you might be there on an evening when one of actual, real-life ABBA decides to come along and watch the show.

Yes, these are a thing and you can purchase items both at the ABBA Arena and via the online shop .

You can choose from a wide range of ABBA Voyage promotional merchandise including reusable water bottles, posters, magnets, ABBA-branded clothing and, of course, an official programme for the concert.

Abba - Voyage [Vinyl]

Related: Mamma Mia! I Have a Dream crowns winners

You can also get classic ABBA output on vinyl , as well as a selection of items commemorating the 50th anniversary of the band's iconic Eurovision-winning track 'Waterloo'.

Unfortunately, the ABBA Voyage cassettes now seem to be sold out on the band's main store (so you may have to try your luck on eBay or purchase via ABBA's US store .

ABBA Voyage is now booking until January 5, 2025. Tickets are on sale via official partner Ticketmaster .

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Audrey diwan’s ‘emmanuelle’ to open san sebastian film festival, breaking news.

• Eurovision Song Contest Organizers Tease An ABBA Anniversary Twist And Switch-Up Voting Rules, Competition Format Ahead of Live Shows

By Stewart Clarke

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ABBA ’s Waterloo has been voted the greatest song in Eurovision history, and with the Song Contest in Sweden this year, the organizers have a surprise ABBA tribute up their sleeves. Changes are also being introduced to both the voting system and the format of the live shows. There will be full live performances in the semi-finals from the artists representing the ‘big five’ countries for the first time, and the public vote will now open at the start of the live final.

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Swedish TV producer Martin Österdahl is the Executive Supervisor of Eurovision and took a few minutes out from preparations to speak to Deadline. He acknowledged the wider dimensions to the competition, with security levels heightened in Sweden and more protests planned by those unhappy about Israel’s participation.

Österdahl said, however, he wants the event to be a celebration, notably with Sweden’s strong ties to the competition. “We’ve got Sweden’s historic seventh win, tying the all-time record with Ireland, we’ve got Loreen who is the champion and the only woman to ever win this contest twice, and of course, there’s this particular group called ABBA that won the contest 50 years ago with Waterloo , we will be celebrating all these things,” he said.

The anniversary of the momentous Waterloo performance that won Eurovision and helped propel ABBA to superstardom has even inspired a feature doc, as Deadline revealed last week.

Österdahl would not be drawn further on the planned ABBA celebration but another Eurovision insider teased that the tribute would be “something never seen on TV before.” Fans have speculated that ABBA might appear in virtual form as they do in the ABBA Voyage concerts in London. That show uses motion capture to create digital avatars of the band.

The format shake-ups include having the acts representing the ‘big five’ countries – France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and the UK – perform their songs live and in full during the semi-finals. They still automatically have a place in the final. The same is true of Sweden as host country.

Another tweak for the 68th edition means viewers will be able to vote from the start of the show this year rather than having to wait for the final performance to end, as has been the case. This has happened twice before, but not since 2011. International Eurovision fans can vote even earlier. They can watch rehearsal footage and videos and then make their choice 24 hours before the semi-final and final shows.

The semi-finals are still decided by public vote and the finals by a mixture of a jury and public vote. The semis take place on May 7 and 9. The final is on May 11.

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Moscow City Symphony-Russian Philharmonic/Dmitri Jurowski – review

G lorying in a name that seems to have been chosen by a very large committee, the Moscow City Symphony-Russian Philharmonic is a smart modern orchestra based in the city's glitzy modern concert hall . Judging by its London debut, however, it is old-school where it counts.

Its chief conductor is Dmitri Jurowski , and his appearance meant there would be a Jurowski on the Festival Hall podium four times in a week; big brother Vladimir was in the audience to cheer him on. The programme was Russian and proud. Extracts from Prokofiev's ballet Cinderella immediately introduced a distinctive sound, soft-edged but hefty, with well-blended strings underpinned by weighty low woodwind; the rasp of the bass clarinet and contrabassoon were to become gratifyingly familiar sounds.

But not so much in Prokofiev's Third Piano Concerto, in which the orchestra seemed to be consciously ceding focus to Alexander Ghindin 's piano playing. While Ghindin was all offhand, unfussy brilliance, the orchestra were neat and contained – except, that is, for the opening of the slow movement, when the flute phrasing made the melody sound positively flirty, and Ghindin responded in smooth, almost louche style. His encore, Rachmaninov's G minor Prelude, whizzed by in a flurry of sonorous chords, but the richness with which he brought out the secondary melodies in the middle section spoke of attention to detail worn lightly.

That was just a taster for the main Rachmaninov event – the colossus that is the Symphony No 2, approached by Jurowski with a certain lightness of touch and all the better for it. It was because he began the third movement so gently and at so flowing a pace that he was able to make such an impact with the sense of stillness after its climax. The second movement was crisp, the finale buoyant – and the encore, the Infernal Dance from Stravinsky's Firebird, was a flamboyant signoff from an orchestra confident of hitting its mark.

• Classical music

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Ticketing Information

Now booking until 5 January 2025, the ABBA Arena has plenty of ticket choices: have the time of your life on the dance floor, party in style in your own dance booth, or take in the atmosphere from our auditorium seating.

Dance Floor

These tickets are for standing or dancing. The area is general admission and is a great place to meet your group of friends as you are free to dance anywhere within the area.

Auditorium Seating

Choose from a wide variety of seats at a range of different prices. Pricing is based on the location of the seats, but in our purpose-built arena every seat is a good one. Please be aware that people around you may stand up and dance, we encourage those who want to dance to book the dancefloor.

Dance Booths

We have eight Dance Booths in total, with capacity for either 10 or 12 people. These are flexible spaces, so you can book an individual ticket, or a whole booth for your party. Each booth has seating, plus your very own dance floor and dedicated booth bar.

Accessible Seats

The ABBA Arena has plenty of wheelchair spaces, ambulant seats and seats suitable for a wheelchair user to transfer into. All of these seats and spaces must be booked in advance and are clearly marked on our seating plan.

Groups Booking

If you would like to book for 15 people or more, email: [email protected] .

Looking for short term availability?

Check our availability calendar for returns

Get your Tickets from £55

Best available from December

Frequently Asked Questions

How much are tickets, and how many people can i come with.

• Concert ticket prices start from £21.50 (plus a £2.95 Ticketmaster handling fee per transaction) and there are plenty of ticket types to choose from. Take a look at our   tickets page for more information or check out   Ticketmaster   for more information on prices.
• You’ll be able to book up to 14 tickets at a time for the main auditorium and Dance Floor and up to 44 tickets in the Dance Booths.

Where can I find my tickets?

For ABBA Voyage, we’re offering an e-ticketing system. This means you’ll only be able to access your tickets through your Ticketmaster account, or the app, using a smartphone – they won’t be emailed to you or available for print.

If you can’t see them straightaway, don’t worry this is just one of the security features. They should appear in your account around 5 days before the concert.

For more questions about your tickets, please get in touch with Ticketmaster.

Can I have an exchange or refund? 

Unfortunately, Ticketmaster don’t offer exchanges or refunds, but they can help you sell your ticket to another fan. Please get in touch with them  here .

Can I only buy tickets from official ticketing partners? 

The simple answer is yes. We reserve the right to refuse entry to guests with tickets purchased from re-sale websites. Tickets purchased via our official partners must not be sold or advertised for sale anywhere else. Any ticket advertised for sale in this way will be automatically void.

Can I pay for my tickets in instalments?

Yes – for this concert you can pay in instalments using Klarna or PayPal.

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DMC Moscow was set up by professionals. Our main aim in founding our company was to bring together experience, knowledge, creative ideas, and creative management in the MICE industry so as to be able to offer you high-quality service which is focused entirely on the client. Organizing unique business events requires profound and comprehensive knowledge of the region, advanced technologies, a team of experienced professionals, and, of course, responsible suppliers of services. We are proud to be able to call upon reliable and professional partners who provide excellent quality of service at competitive prices. Our extensive network of contacts throughout the region gives you access to experienced and well-qualified specialists.

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