What is ABBA doing??

Voulez-vous a new ABBA album? If you just shouted “Oui, si-vous-plait!" at your unsuspecting screen, you may be in luck. The Swedish Europop sensations who last dropped a chart-topping track in 1982 and who promised new music in 2018 that never materialized are once again hinting that a fresh ABBA song (or an entire album, for those who dare to dream big) could be coming our way, along with a possible concert film experience.

The Twitter account ABBA Voyage (on the platform since February of 2021) just posted a mysterious tweet asking fans to join them, including a link to a website where you can register for… something.   

Is it a Jeff Bezos-style trip to space with group members Agnetha, Benny, Bj­örn, and Frida? Probably not. Is it new, infectious, pop music? We can only hope so. Whatever it is, the site and social media posts promise that it’s arriving this September. Dancing Queens and Super Troupers, mark your calendars for the 2nd. 

The unreleased 2018 tracks, “I Still Have Faith in You” and “Don’t Shut Me Down” are likely to be part of whatever shape this new project takes. And while ABBA’s Bjorn Ulvaeus “promised” new songs back in 2018, this year, he’s on the record as saying that it’s a definite thing.

"It’s not a case anymore of it might happen, it will happen,” he, um, promised again in an interview with the Herald Sun (via Variety).

Along with the new music, it’s possible that the long-talked-about documentary/virtual reality project featuring avatars of ABBA’s younger selves — a collaboration between the band and Simon Fuller (of American Idol fame) — might debut next month.

“He came to Stockholm,” said Ulvaeus of Fuller, “and he presented this idea to us that we could make identical digital copies of ourselves of a certain age and that those copies could then go on tour and they could sing our songs, you know, and lip sync. I’ve seen this project half-way through and it’s already mind-boggling.”

One thing is for certain, the foursome did spend time back in the studio together recording.

“We had such a good time,” said Benny Andersson recalling the sessions. “We really, really did, we were all back to where we ended, having fun. It was just like no time had passed, we all felt that and we were all happy about feeling that.”

BEFORE YOU GO: Selena Gomez addresses childhood criticism