(Stockholm) Eternal youth thanks to digital: ABBA is launching a series of state-of-the-art digital avatar concerts in London on Friday, which will “take over” from the four seventies of the Swedish cult band.
Posted yesterday at 10:41 a.m.
“We put our hearts and souls in these avatars and they will take over,” Björn Ulvaeus, one of the members of the Scandinavian quartet met in Stockholm ahead of the premiere, told AFP.
After nearly four decades of silence and de facto separation, ABBA released a new album in November (Travel). The kings and queens of disco had also announced the construction of a special room in London for a digital show prepared for years with special effects experts.
If it is indeed the current voices of Anni-Frid, Björn, Benny, and Agnetha (acronym “ABBA”) that we will hear, it is not them in flesh and blood that we will see on stage, but four “ABBAtars” released as a hologram, depicting the band members with their faces from 1979.
After other mixed experiences of concerts of holograms by artists who have disappeared or who are too tired, the four hope to have found the key to pass the emotion this time.
“It’s one of the most daring projects that has ever been done in the music sector,” says Björn Ulvaeus, who composed most of the group’s greatest hits with his friend Benny Andersson.
“How the public will welcome it, I have no idea, but I believe that they will feel an emotional power from the avatars, that they will see them as real people”, says the 77-year-old who is the oldest of the ABBAs.
The movements of the septuagenarians were captured in the studio to reproduce them on stage.
If avatars should sometimes appear wearing the legendary outfits seventies emblematic of ABBA, they will also be dressed in futuristic jumpsuits, according to the concert trailers.
In a 3,000-seat venue in east London (the “ABBA Arena”), concerts are scheduled seven days a week until early October.
“I don’t know about the others, but as far as I’m concerned, I was more stressed a month ago than today. Now I know we did our best,” says Björn.
“Almost Someone Else”
The four avatars were developed in collaboration with a visual effects company from George Lucas, director of the Star Wars saga.
For Björn Ulvaeus, ABBA’s ubiquitous archival footage primed him to see himself in the face of his 30-something glory.
“For most people, it will probably be weird, but I have seen myself younger almost every day, all my life since we separated”, explains the star, who is launching a musical show in Sweden in parallel. to Pippi Longstocking.
“In one form or another, in pictures, on TV, so I’m pretty used to ‘him’ […] It’s me, but it’s almost someone else, ”underlines one of the two “B” of ABBA.
“When I see my avatar on stage, it’s like a mixture. As if I had a life infused in this guy that we see on the screen”.
Winner of Eurovision in 1974, ABBA enjoyed worldwide success thanks to his cult songs such as Waterloo, Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (A Man after Midnight) or The Winner Takes it All until its dissolution in the early 1980s.
But to everyone’s surprise, the band’s success continued after their breakup, fueled later by clever revivals like the film series Mamma Mia.
With hundreds of millions of albums sold all over the world, ABBA has largely contributed to promoting the Swedish music industry, which is still today the third largest music exporting country after the United States and the United Kingdom.
In London, spectators will be entitled to an hour and a half of concert – with a dozen musicians themselves present.
But seeing ABBA on stage again in real life or releasing a new album is not planned.
“ABBA has no project… That’s how it is,” Björn Ulvaeus told AFP.