ABBA: The Thread

[Jan]

srsmerdon said:

The Australian Chart runs:

Ring Ring - 12/11/73: 92,92
Waterloo - 10/06/74: 70,66,41,24,16,15,14,11,7,6,4,5,7,9,9,9,17,25,35,45,52,63
Honey, Honey - 04/11/74: 93,69,64,48,43,41,39,33,30,30,32,30,35,??,47,63,66,74,93
Ring Ring - 13/01/75: 90,90,96
I've Been Waiting For You - 14/04/75: 89,89,76,62,49,51,56,57,67,81
I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do - 07/07/75 : 83,76,68,67,65,52,46,32,29,22,19,9,4,2,1,1,1,2,5,7,7,10,15,
15,18,22,25,32,32,42,46,50,71,78
Mamma Mia - 22/09/75 : 52,27,23,11,9,4,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,3,4,5,5,7,10,14,22,29,
31,34,31,29,31,34,36,44,54,56,61,63,65
SOS - 10/11/75 : 77,48,30,21,6,3,2,2,2,1,2,2,2,2,4,6,12,16,17,20,28,28,26,
38,25,37,49,61,81
Ring Ring - 09/02/76: 56,41,34,26,14,10,7,7,12,11,11,10,16,17,17,18,25,32,41,51,
54,68,76
Fernando - 15/03/76: 75,14,2,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,2,2,2,3,3,6,7,8,9,11,16,21,
29,34,39,50,48,58,58,70,86,88,93
Waterloo (EP) - 22/03/76 : 88,68,60,67,67
Rock Me - 12/04/76: 43,28,16,13,9,7,5,7,5,4,4,6,8,11,11,16,16,17,23,28,40,43,49,53,54,68
Hasta Mañana - 10/05/76 : 95,89,68,44,35,28,22,21,20,16,20,21,28,30,36,52,75,93
Dancing Queen - 16/08/76: 38,8,3,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,2,4,5,6,7,10,20,25,25,27,32,46,60,73
Money, Money, Money - 01/11/76: 53,5,1,1,1,1,1,1,2,4,8,11,20,20,28,64,70,82
Knowing Me, Knowing You/Happy Hawaii - 07/03/77: 40,18,11,9,9,10,15,18,24,32,33,44,62,78,83
King Kong Song/I've Been Waiting For You - 14/03/77: 98,94,96
The Name Of The Game - 07/11/77: 62,28,19,14,11,10,7,7,7,6,10,13,18,23,30,45,65,88,89
Take A Chance On Me - 30/01/78: 55,44,32,26,20,13,12,17,24,26,27,37,54,79
Eagle/Thank You For The Music - 05/06/78: 97,91,90,85,94,82
Summer Night City - 16/10/78: 56,37,24,20,16,16,13,16,19,24,24,27,34,62,73
Chiquitita - 19/02/79: 94,31,25,13,9,5,5,4,4,5,11,13,20,23,28,41,56,66,99
Does Your Mother Know - 04/06/79: 83,43,30,21,13,9,9,7,8,11,18,23,34,45,59,73
Voulez-Vous - 27/08/79: 93,79
Voulez-Vous - 17/09/79: 98,88,82,80,80,80,80,87
Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! - 12/11/79: 80,58,42,27,20,17,10,9,9,8,8,12,13,18,25,42,60,74
I Have A Dream - 03/03/80: 100,71,66,64,71,71,76,76,75,77,80,95,92
The Winner Takes It All - 18/08/80: 79,57,47,42,37,33,18,13,10,7,10,9,12,15,21,23,30,34,44,55,55,69,70
On And On And On - 15/12/80: 60,31,22,22,16,9,10,19,24,29,35,54
Super Trouper - 30/03/81: 92,92,92,77,91
One Of Us - 11/01/82: 72,61,55,56,48,52,61,65,70,76,85,86,98
When All Is Said And Done - 26/04/82: 82,86,81
The Day Before You Came - 15/11/82: 93,67,61,61,48,51,56,80
Under Attack - 14/02/83: 98,96
Dancing Queen - 26/10/92: 53,43,31,31,28,41,71,76,93


Source: www.abba-world.net

Their singles actually didn't do as well as expected in their "second" home country.Im sure their albums must've been big sellers there though.

[Smurfie]

I must admit, when I saw these, I wondered why the sudden drop off in the late 77/early 78 in their high charting singles.

Anything to do with the film that was released around the same time? Or just a general drop in interest? They did chart a heck of a lot more singles in Australia than in most other territories. I'm not completely an expert on Australias charts, but is it sales based, or do they count airplay too?

[Jan]

srsmerdon said:

I must admit, when I saw these, I wondered why the sudden drop off in the late 77/early 78 in their high charting singles.

Anything to do with the film that was released around the same time? Or just a general drop in interest? They did chart a heck of a lot more singles in Australia than in most other territories. I'm not completely an expert on Australias charts, but is it sales based, or do they count airplay too?

Hello, i would say! Im sure it is/was only sales based, like the SA chart.I hate it when they start adding airplay, which comes down to radio station manipulation imo.

[Smurfie]

jannie said:

Hello, i would say!

Hi!

I may have to dig out some Swedish chart stats to see how they compare.

Thanks to this thread, I've done nothing but listen to ABBA for four days. I must have listen to The Visitors a DOZEN times.

[Jan]

srsmerdon said:

jannie said:

Hello, i would say!

Hi!

I may have to dig out some Swedish chart stats to see how they compare.

Thanks to this thread, I've done nothing but listen to ABBA for four days. I must have listen to The Visitors a DOZEN times.

The Visitors is a brilliant album.Should i laugh or cry is on there as well if i remember correctly.I let the music speak is such an awesome song.Benny or Bjorn said something about if that song wasn't used on Visitors they would've used it in a stage show or something like Chess!

[Jan]

Talking about the Swedish charts, i read in the booklet with Definitive collection that very few singles ever got relesed in Sweden.Their albums were all huge sellers there though.

[Jan]

SWEDEN SINGLES:
Swedish Singles Date Title HP(1) TI
25/07/72 People Need Love 17 05
27/02/73 Ring Ring (Bara Du Slog En Signal) 01 (06) 17
20/03/73 Ring Ring 02 08
12/03/74 Waterloo (Swedish Version) 02 15
12/03/74 Waterloo 03 10
28/01/75 So Long 07 08
12/04/76 Fernando 02 22
26/08/76 Dancing Queen 01 (14) 32
04/11/77 The Name Of The Game 02 18
22/09/78 Summer Night City 01 (01) 20
09/02/79 Chiquitita 02 24
14/12/79 Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! 16 06
08/08/80 The Winner Takes It All 02 16
28/11/80 Super Trouper 11 08
22/12/81 One Of Us 02 13
09/11/82 The Day Before You Came 03 10
02/09/92 Dancing Queen 15 08
13/12/99 Happy New Year 27 04
05/01/07 Happy New Year 22 01

source: www.zip.com.au/~callisto/abba.html

[Sauron]

Where do you get all this info from

[Jan]

sauron said:

Where do you get all this info from

Im a clever boy you know.
Honestly, the SA one from a site about the South African singles chart archives and the Swedish one from a site listing ABBA 's worldwide singles positions.Which probably means i should give them credit!*jannie goes into editing posts mode*

[Sauron]

thanks for the info

[Jan]

sauron said:

thanks for the info

You're welcome!

[Sauron]

Don't know if you have been asked this already but what is your fav ABBA track jannie

[Jan]

sauron said:

Don't know if you have been asked this already but what is your fav ABBA track jannie

my current list, but i think it might stay pretty much the same over time:
1.Thank you for the music
2.The day before you came
3.Head over heals
4.Money Money Money
5.Knowing me knowing you
6.Me and i
7.Under attack
8.SOS
9.I let the music speak
10.As good as new( i don't like this one as much now as i did 20 years ago though)
i might extend it to a Top 40 as they are so many excellent ones.ABBA had some great B sides to.My favourate must be Should i laugh or cry, think it was the one for One of us.

[Sauron]

A whole chart!

[Jan]

sauron said:

A whole chart!

Yeah, give me a couple of days and i will have my ABBA Top 40/50 ready!they did have a LOT of songs though so it's quite a task to work through all!

[Sauron]

I look forward to it

[Jan]

jannie's Top 40 favourate ABBA songs in the world ... ever!
* refers to album tracks as far as i know, although some might have been released in one or two countries as singles.

1.Thank you for the music
2.The day before you came
3.Head over heals
4.Money Money Money
5.Knowing me knowing you
6.Me and i*
7.Under attack
8.SOS
9.I let the music speak*
10.As good as new*
11.The winner takes it all
12.Gimme Gimme (a man after midnight)
13.Should i laugh or cry*
14.Happy new year*(?)
15.One of us
16.Move on*
17.Super Trouper
18.Lay all your love on me
19.Chiquitita
20.Our last summer*
21.My love, my life*
22.The name of the game
23.Eagle
24.Dancing Queen
25.One man, one woman*
26.That's me*
27.Voulez-Vous
28.I've been waiting for you*
29.Soldiers*
30.I do I do I do I do
31.The piper*
32.Angeleyes
33.Fernando
34.Take a chance on me
35.If it wasn't for the nights*
36.Waterloo
37.Two for the price of one*
38.When all is said and done*(?)
39.Summer night city
40.I have a dream.
And there you have it!!It is pretty much in the order of how special they are to me.Now list your Top 40 ABBA tunes!!Maybe we can make a combined favourate Haven ABBA chart of all time??What do you think Smurfie?

[rubcale]

It's hard to rank their songs they're all magnificent. Strangely, one of the few I never really rated is Waterloo! My favourite is Knowing Me Knowing You.

Although they did well in Sweden I would have expected the singles they did release to have done better - only three #1s.

One thing I don't understand. After a string of top 10 hits - One Of Us was a big seller at Christmas 1981, then just a couple of months later Head Over Heels which had been voted as fans as their favourite track on The Visitors "flopped". Being an album track didn't seem to matter in the past but even if they were starting to lose popularity you would have though it would have been close to the top 10 at least.

At that stage there was no chart published Christmas week although it was thought to have been compiled and rumours have always surfaced (never substantiated) that One Of Us went to #1 that week.

[Jan]

rubcale said:

It's hard to rank their songs they're all magnificent. Strangely, one of the few I never really rated is Waterloo! My favourite is Knowing Me Knowing You.

Although they did well in Sweden I would have expected the singles they did release to have done better - only three #1s.

One thing I don't understand. After a string of top 10 hits - One Of Us was a big seller at Christmas 1981, then just a couple of months later Head Over Heels which had been voted as fans as their favourite track on The Visitors "flopped". Being an album track didn't seem to matter in the past but even if they were starting to lose popularity you would have though it would have been close to the top 10 at least.

At that stage there was no chart published Christmas week although it was thought to have been compiled and rumours have always surfaced (never substantiated) that One Of Us went to #1 that week.

Hi, i think there was a bit of an ABBA backlash, maybe an overdose in the eyes of the public, it was a good ten years for ABBA to become fashionable again and then many realised (including myself) what a brillant masterpiece The Visitors was, maybe it was too serious at the time for the "average" ABBA fan in the early 80's.Even i didn't like The day before you came at first, but now ranks as one of their best that stood the test of time!AS you can see i agree on your point about Waterloo and Knowing me, Knowing you!
I also read the rumours about One of us.Apparently it could not have been no.1 as Dont you want me-Human League sold far too many copies over that period of time for One of us to have outsold it to be no.1.But it did sell a lot for a record that "only " got to no.3 (the same position it reached in South Africa).
About the Swedish singles positions, remember only a few of their songs ever got released as singles there.Their albums sold mega amounts there!

[Smurfie]

jannie said:

SWEDEN SINGLES:
Swedish Singles Date Title HP(1) TI
25/07/72 People Need Love 17 05
27/02/73 Ring Ring (Bara Du Slog En Signal) 01 (06) 17
20/03/73 Ring Ring 02 08
12/03/74 Waterloo (Swedish Version) 02 15
12/03/74 Waterloo 03 10
28/01/75 So Long 07 08
12/04/76 Fernando 02 22
26/08/76 Dancing Queen 01 (14) 32
04/11/77 The Name Of The Game 02 18
22/09/78 Summer Night City 01 (01) 20
09/02/79 Chiquitita 02 24
14/12/79 Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! 16 06
08/08/80 The Winner Takes It All 02 16
28/11/80 Super Trouper 11 08
22/12/81 One Of Us 02 13
09/11/82 The Day Before You Came 03 10
02/09/92 Dancing Queen 15 08
13/12/99 Happy New Year 27 04
05/01/07 Happy New Year 22 01

source: www.zip.com.au/~callisto/abba.html

Yes, they couldn't quite replicate their success in their homeland as in Australia and the UK. The Day Before You Came did much better in Sweden though Fourteen weeks for Dancing Queen is not to be sniffed at I guess!

(I sourced my Australian stats from the same website as you by the way! Great ABBA stats! )