Voyage review: ABBA’s first new music in 40 years offers the warm glow of nostalgia but isn’t a new pop classic

ABBA fans have hoped for the Swedish supergroup’s comeback for 40 years, but tis is what’s missing and why many will go back to their classics.

ABBA’s new music precedes their Voyage concert experience which debuts in London in May. Picture: Supplied

Swedish pop supergroup ABBA’s surprise reunion record Voyage may offer the warm glow of a nostalgia trip back to the seventies but it ain’t no Arrival.

That 1976 mega-record gave the world the enduring disco classic Dancing Queen, which Benny, Bjorn, Frida and Agnetha mined for Don’t Shut Me Down, one of two new songs they released in September to herald their recording comeback after 40 years.

ABBA’s new music precedes their Voyage concert experience which debuts in London in May. Picture: Supplied

The other fresh album taster I Still Faith In You was also ecstatically welcomed by the legion of fans who have maintained their adoration of ABBA since they went on a “short break” in 1982 or discovered them via the musicals and films which have generationally refreshed their audience over the decades.

But neither track dented the ARIA top 20 singles and Don’t Shut Me Down has generated 28 million Spotify streams since its release on September 2.

Considering the band have 19 million monthly listeners on the platform, that ratio suggests most fans would prefer another hit of Mamma Mia or Gimme Gimme Gimme (A Man After Midnight) than their new stuff. Or they’re just hanging out to buy Voyage on vinyl or CD.

And this record will be their last, according to Benny Andersson.

“This is it. It’s got to be, you know,” he told The Guardian.

ABBA’s Voyage cover. Picture: Supplied

The truth about their comeback record is that serves as the musical marketing tool for the ABBA Voyage Concert, featuring the four members as ABBAtars “performing” with a 10-piece live band, which opens in London in May.

“We knew if there was a show, we would need a couple of new songs to go with it … When we got into the studio after 39 years it was like no time had passed … we had a great time,” said.

The band’s creative controllers, Andersson and Bjorn Ulvaeus, fashioned Voyage in their own ABBA bubble, deliberately blind to prevailing trends or any temptation to adopt contemporary production techniques – even as they were also making a technologically futuristic stage show.

Like all of their album output through the 70s and early 80s, Voyage is a hit and miss affair.

One cannot fault the pristine vocals of Frida and Agnetha, nor the wide-screen pop production of Bjorn and Benny, all of which serve to wrap the listener in the comforting capsule of nostalgia.

The good new stuff includes the jaunty piano pop of recent third single Just A Notion or the disco drama of Keep An Eye On Dan, which is also a worthy addition to the quartet’s revered collection of songs about divorce.

But the lyrical clunkiness and off-kilter sonic detours which often jarred in the 70s are also repeated on their comeback album.

The ABBAtars who will perform during the Voyage concert are also frozen in time. Picture: Supplied

ABBA’s version of an Irish pub song, When You Danced With Me, seems a bizarre attempt to “go Celtic” and replicate the acoustic balladry of their other geo-hopping successes Fernando and Chiquita.

Equally weird is the inclusion of Christmas song Little Things – perfectly timed for a November album release but an odd fit with the rest of the record.

On the lyrical front, you have to wonder why Frida and Agnetha agreed to sing on I Can Be That Woman about the “female” rival for her husband’s attentions, who turns out to be a dog.

Voyage serves its purpose as an appetiser for ABBA’s bold new concert venture but after its first week of release, it’s likely most fans will return to the ABBA Gold playlist.

Originally published as Voyage review: ABBA’s first new music in 40 years offers the warm glow of nostalgia but isn’t a new pop classic