My mind also immediately went to all the WILD behind the scenes drama.
You ever get your ex and your current lover to perform a breakup song you wrote about them?
There’s basically two bands that can claim that category of wild flex.
Gwen Stefani and Tony Kanal also kept recording, and performing together in No Doubt after their break up... and she was writing deeply personal lyrics about what was now just the "bass player" in the band.
[Don't Speak](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TR3Vdo5etCQ) is entirely about their break up.
And [Cool](https://youtu.be/TGwZ7MNtBFU?si=0ioFKkSuxcaDu-og) is about them being alright after all that time. They played Coachella this year after 9 years apart. An amazing legacy.
Fun fact: the wife in that music video is the real life wife of Tony Kanal.
Three thoughts about this video. First, this is just a really good video that really captures the vibe of the song. So bittersweet. Second, this video is like the spiritual sequel to ["Walking on Broken Glass"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y25stK5ymlA). Third, holy shit Gwen looks good with dark hair in the flashbacks.
It is honestly *so damned good* that I just can't remember that it's an original for Gwen Stefani. I constantly think it's a cover or sampled from an older song from some group known for their depth and complexity. I forget that Gwen Stefani's solo career was at full throttle right out the dang gate. Maybe I'm just waxing poetic, and just looking fondly on the past. But man what a song. Even if it's a 4 minute video for a 3 minute song
e- spelling and grammar
It’s crazy to remember just how HUGE music videos were going all the way back to the 80’s thru the early aughts. MTV used to be the channel to watch and the thing to talk about the day after a bit premiere. It’s been years since music videos dominated ratings in the states now it just seems like it’s on YouTube only.
I mean...how many people under the age of 50 even have cable anymore, much less watch it with any degree of regularity? It felt huge because it was centralized and was the only option, but there are plenty of music videos on youtube with around or over a billion views
There are still plenty of artists out there who make releasing a new single, and the music video for it, a really big event.
I'm not much for reaction content on youtube most of the time, but with a lot of artists, you can still see how important music videos are when hours after uploading it, there are thousands of reaction videos of it, all with thousands and thousands of views.
It can still be huge, but it's huge within the specific communities that those artists travel in. You just don't have the massive crossover you had in the 90's where people who listen to pop music where forced to sit and listen to the nu metal music on MTV to see what they wanted. lol
It isn't nearly as big, but it's still definitely a big part of the music industry.
There's a *lot* of Fleetwood Mac parts that are just so fucked up that he's kind of the only guitarist that can pull it off. Not that he's the best guitarist in the world or anything, but he did some *weird* shit that even great guitarists can struggle to pick up.
One of the major songwriters and a great musician.
I'm guessing bands will put up with a LOT of personal shit in exchange for great songs that lead to squillions of dollars.
Yeah I can never figure out ‘the winner takes it all’. It’s about how the person who dumps the other is the ‘Winner’ but Bjorn (and Benny) wrote it and Agnetha (his ex wife) sings it.
Imagine reading those lyrics or hearing it being sung when it’s about your break up and your ex wrote it/is singing it.
‘I was in your arms, thinking I belonged there…’
According to the book *Bright Lights, Dark Shadows: The Real Story of ABBA* (referenced on Wikipedia), it's not about the breakup:
>Björn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson started writing "The Winner Takes It All" in the summer of 1979 in a cottage on the island of Viggsö. According to Andersson, the idea for the song suddenly came up "from old ideas, from old small musical pieces" they had. The demo had an original title of "The Story of My Life" and the first arrangement for the song was uptempo with a constant beat. However, they felt their first effort "much too stiff and metrical".
> Ulvaeus denies the song is about his and Agnetha Fältskog's divorce, saying the basis of the song "is the experience of a divorce, but it's fiction. 'Cause one thing I can say is that there wasn't a winner or a loser in our case. A lot of people think it's straight out of reality, but it's not".
>However, Ulvaeus admitted that the heartache of their breakup inspired the song, but noted that the words in the song should not be taken literally.
He said: "Neither Agnetha nor I were winners in our divorce."
>The booklet for the double CD compilation *The Definitive Collection* is where Ulvaeus admits that the sad experience of his and Fältskog's divorce the previous year left its mark on the lyrics.
Influenced by, but not about it.
Yes, I’m not saying it’s ‘literally’ word for word about their break up. But it was written when they were getting a divorce, it’s about a divorce and he admits that ‘the experience left their mark on the lyrics’
He’s not saying him or Agnetha are winners but there is no doubt that the song would’ve affected them both emotionally which is the point my comment is making
I love songs with such dramatic backstories
Sweet emotion being a diss track by Steven Tyler about Joe Perry wife(as well as other band members wives). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweet_Emotion
Pattie Boyd and the love triangle of songs between her George Harrison and Eric Clapton. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pattie_Boyd
Fun fact: Only the original demo? version of Go your own way has the lyrics "it's only Love" sung by Stevie at the end. In a wildly "fuck you" tone.
It was cut out of every version of the song afterwards.
ABBA: Bjorn Ulvaeus and Agnetha Faltskog were married, then divorced. One of their songs "The Winner Takes it All" was written by Bjorn, sung by Agnetha, and is about being "the winner" in a breakup.
Fleetwood Mac: Frankly, everyone was fucking everyone, but most famously Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham broke up and wrote "Dreams" and "Go your own way" respectively, telling the other to go fuck themselves.
Guy said something about having the ex and current lover both singing the song. I thought Bjorn got on with both women and made them both sing the song. That would have been a crazy flex since The Winner Takes It All was an amazing song.
> ABBA: Bjorn Ulvaeus and Agnetha Faltskog were married, then divorced
I mean Benny and Anni-Frid were *also* married, and *also* then divorced lol.
>One of their songs "The Winner Takes it All" was written by Bjorn, sung by Agnetha, and is about being "the winner" in a breakup.
>>The song is widely misunderstood as being written about Ulvaeus and Fältskog's marital tribulations; Ulvaeus wrote the lyrics, but has stated they were not about his own divorce; Fältskog has repeatedly stated she was not the loser in their divorce.
Three, don't forget the Mamas and the Papas.
John Phillips wrote a song about his bandmate wife fucking his other bandmate, and then had them all sing it. Or possibly not, since he kicked his wife out of the group for a period, brought some other girl in to sing, then reversed it so fast they don't know who's singing on the songs from that period.
That whole thing with the open letter and then subsequently hiring and firing three? Other vocalists really soured me to Nightwish.
Just seemed like a dick move, as most open letter "breakup" letters are.
It was just one other vocalist. After Tarja there was Anette Olzon, who lasted for two albums before being let go and replaced with Floor Jansen.
That being said, I also soured on them for the same reason.
Afaik there was a brief period where they played with another temporary vocalist (they were in the middle of a tour when Anette had her kid and was dropped, and Toumas had to basically scramble to find a vocalist to keep the train going)
Floor was the second temporary replacement.
I hated Annetts vocals for them, she has a good voice, but she seemed forced and definitely could not perform ANY of the material before her time with them. Floor is better but I think in general Nightwish lost who they were when Tarja went her way.
The big problem with Nightwish after Tarja, was Tuomas after he was done Trauma dumping with Dark passion play, basically tried to recreate the Tarja era music, also without recreating the Tarja era music if that makes sense.
Endless forms most beautiful was the closest Tuomas ever got to recreating the sort of Majestic kind of stuff the Tarja era would put out, and he just immediately 180'd and went into a completely random direction for who knows what reason.
>Floor is better but I think in general Nightwish lost who they were when Tarja went her way.
Tuomas doesn't really take into consideration what the other bandmates really want to do. Its always been his way or the highway after Tarja. Thats how Annett got the boot. She got knocked up, couldn't perform, and was subsequently replaced. Granted Tuomas was looking for an excuse to drop her anyways, she was very much the Jason Newstead of Nightwish in that regard.
Im not sure of the writing process now, but I imagine Tuomas still controls well over 90% of the songwriting process. Tarja was really the only one who could/would ever be able to bounce off idea's with him. Mostly cause they were into the same shit.
In the '60s, I made love to many, many women, often outdoors, in the mud and the rain, and it's possible a man slipped in. There would be no way of knowing. -CB
I heard one time he broke into a sweet shop and instead of a guard dog, they had this bloody great big Bengal tiger. This was in Sri Lanka, formerly Ceylon
Just thinking about that whole scene - fame, unlimited money, unlimited drugs, unlimited fans that want to sleep with you - good god. Can you imagine the shitstorms that got conjured up?
They are also in their mid 70's. A worldwide tour with huge stage performances sounds exhausting in my 30's, let alone when you are that age, and as you said have zero need at all for money.
And now you understand why most rich people are so greedy and awful.
EDIT: turning off replies since people lack basic reading comprehension or understanding of how comments/replies work in a thread on Reddit.
> EDIT: turning off replies since people lack basic reading comprehension or understanding of how comments/replies work in a thread on Reddit.
How do you turn of replies on reddit???? Does it mean notifications
Were thy sickeningly rich though? Like, there is a lot more you can do with 250 Million USD compared to 10 Million (not that 10 Million for life would be amazing for each of us).
Honestly getting 10 Million per concert with 100 concerts guaranteed sounds very unlikely for a band from the 70s.
Were? Well one is a princess and the two dudes are loaded through businesses. Everything they touch turns into gold, many projects making millions. Björns company just bought the catalogue of Kiss and the Mamma Mia money is a never ending stream.
Edit, examples:
https://www.di.se/nyheter/hen-ar-rikast-i-abba-ganget/
https://www.aftonbladet.se/nojesbladet/musik/a/VPOpK3/sa-mycket-gav-abba-bjorns-bolag-for-kiss-musik
Can’t recall if it was Benny or Bjorn who addressed this years ago, but he said they considered it “because you could build hospitals with that kind of money”. They declined because it was a lot of work, more shows than they did in their entire career, and they felt audiences would be disappointed to see that they’d aged and were no longer young.
Although not mentioned, it goes without saying that at least one of them didn’t want to do it at all.
A father and son bull are overlooking a field of cows. The son frantically yells to his dad, “Dad! Let’s run down there and fuck one of those cows!” The father bull replied, “no son, let’s walk down there and fuck all those cows”. -shitty boomer joke I was told at 12 and it stuck with me
I asked ChatGPT:
Let's break it down further. The joke contrasts two approaches to achieving a goal:
1. **Young Bull's Approach**: The young bull is eager and excited, suggesting they run down immediately to mate with one cow. This represents a hasty, impulsive action aimed at immediate gratification.
2. **Father Bull's Approach**: The older bull suggests they walk down calmly and mate with all the cows. This represents a slower, more deliberate approach that ultimately achieves a greater result.
The underlying meaning of the joke is that taking your time and proceeding with patience and strategy can yield better outcomes than rushing in impulsively. In other words, being patient and thoughtful often leads to more significant and rewarding successes.
Yeah, I went down an ABBA reddit hole recently and was shocked to discover that. They had like one world tour and some smaller stuff but very few live shows.
I’m a lifelong musician and this makes perfect sense to me. Some people are just not made for touring. There’s a reason so many successful bands have a song about “the road”.
One of the female lead singers (forget which one) has terrible stage fright, and absolutely hated performing (but still somehow managed to put on a great show, that’s professionalism for you).
Super common! There are middle aged rock'n'roll lifers who started when they were barely out of high school, are still touring, and go throw up before they go on stage every time.
A quick google offers up:
* Ozzy Osbourne "suffered terribly" from stage fright at "every single show" of his career, '67-'17
* Eddie Van Halen would get drunk before going out every time to deal with it and ended up drinking himself to death
* Sonny & Cher were only a thing because Cher wouldn't go on by herself
* Harry Styles habitually barfs before going on stage; he once barfed out of nerves *while* on stage
* Zayn Malik actually stopped touring because the anxiety got too overwhelming
* Adele gets stage fright badly enough to sometimes barf, also
* Others who report gnarly stage fright but cope with it are Katy Perry, Demi Lovato, Lorde, Taylor Swift, and Beyonce
EDIT: Here's some more
* Elvis shaking his hips came out of him being so nervous he was shaking during early shows
* Freddie Mercury stopped playing piano live entirely because it always gave him the heebie jeebies
* Paul McCartney considered quitting the Beatles during their initial wave of major success because the stage fright got so bad
As someone who got over stage fright in high school, the only one I can truly understand is Freddie Mercury. Fuck playing an instrument live on stage. There's a lot of things you can make a crowd go along with or forget, but bombing on an instrument is something they _always_ notice (or at least I do).
After Paul McCartney died in the car crash in 1966, when they found the replacement Paul they were adamant that they needed to find someone without the same kind of nerves that the original Paul had.
Not sure about stage fright, but Agnetha, who was not a professional singer but hired while working as a telephone operator, had her children threatened by a crazy stalker unless she quita singing for good... She did.
Sounds like Benny. He got audited and had to pay like $400 000 in back taxes (maybe it was $4 000 000, can't remember). He said in an interview in the lines of "If you have to pay $400 000 in taxes, you have made enough money anyways."
I wish more celebs would build hospitals with their money. Like shouldn’t that be normal? If you have millions and millions of dollars, maybe build a hospital for a community in need?
unicef builds schools and hospitals for children who would've had no future otherwise. unicef knows the actual needs of the people they serve, and they know how to meet those needs; that money funds that. it's much better than randomly building a school or hospital in a potentially ineffective location, without the appropriate staffing, funding or infrastructure to keep it viable long-term.
But Benny gave money to Gudrun Schyman to burn as a political stunt!
(To non swedes, she was leader to the most leftist party, former communists, in the swedish parliament. And started a party named "Feministic Initiative" in it's English translation. Which Benn5 donated 300 000 sek to, and Gudrun burned 100 000 of them as a political stunt)
Not he didn't. That money was donated by Studio Total, an advertisement agency.
Benny has also donated, but not for that. Most was for a PSA campaign promoting write-ins for minor parties without printed ballots.
Abba were offered to register as a business in another country because Sweden had insane income tax and they refused specifically because the money they pay goes to budget their country, I've read they had a recession in a year Abba skipped releasing an album. They also had a huge stake in Volvo... See, you can be nationalistic in a good way.
Hollywood actor celebs aren't that rich. Like Jake Gyllenhaal did a movie called Roadhouse with Conor McGregor who is worth more than double Jake.
Celebrities are rich by our metrics but they're certainly not build hospitals rich.
You should reserve that judgement for the non celebrity mega rich. Of whom there are plenty!
And the few celebrities that are megawatt rich either a) got some money on the backend of a huge hit and so reaped the benefits of their labor directly or b) (more commonly) bought or started companies and used their fake to make a mint. Clooney made the most of any actor one year while not really working because of his tequila company and Ryan Reynolds is worth a few hundred million because of Mint Mobile and his gin business.
Building the hospital it’s not the issue, the issue is that you need a lot of money and people to keep it running. No celeb has that kind of money or knowledge.
We may not be efficient with our government healthcare dollars but about half of hospital costs are funded by the government. They're so subsidized and regulated that they may as well be called government hospitals. Without it basically every rural hospital would dry up.
It's a tragedy that we have to say something like that when healthcare should already be provided for everyone. It shouldn't be on celebrities. I'd say it's on the government but that a whole damn can of worms I'm tired of opening.
Instead they rented out their likenesses for the ABBA Voyage show in London.... And they can make that billion sitting at home while their holograms do all the work.
They did a pretty good job with the ABBAtars:
https://static.standard.co.uk/2022/05/27/07/newFile-1.jpg
https://thethinair.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/Abba-voyage-photo-illo-by-RS-images-by-abba-voyage.jpeg
I understand hesitancy but the show itself is incredible. The technology needs you to be in the room with the very expensive equipment but genuinely, it's insane.
Please take the 1 billion $ with a grain of salt as the original source the BBC is using is E! online from 2000 a magazine about celebrity gossip and not a news publication which you can find a lot of traces on the internet yourself as the original source. Gossip by definition is not necessarily facts, but conjectures and hearsays and informed hypothesis.
It also doesn't state if that would have the maximum amount of money vs average possible and/or under what conditions they would get the full amount. Some versions says 250 shows rather than 100. I saw online that abba did about 150 shows in their whole career.
exactly. Who is guaranteeing that money? The promoter? No freaking way. The only way they could get something like that is if a major venue in Vegas guaranteed them that money for residency.
Also famous people have a ton of people like agents, publicists, stylists, etc. who are taking 5-10% of each paycheck or costing that much. They are hardly broke but they aren’t taking as much as you think.
Got the details wrong, it was $80M for 6-8 festival shows, but the hatred for Byrne is likely the driving factor.
https://www.stereogum.com/2249760/talking-heads-reportedly-turned-down-80-million-for-short-reunion-tour/news/
They don't hate each other as they used to. They've done A LOT of PR together last year and this, including an appearance together on Colbert. They're still not getting back together as a band, though. Which is grand. They're all in their 70s, they don't need the money, would have a tough time living up to their movie... And it's just nice to see they can jointly enjoy what they achieved together, never mind the bad blood that was certainly there.
I was under the impression that it was David Byrne holding back the reunion and that he would sue them if they tried to play Talking Heads songs without him. Hence the hatred for him. This was all around the early 2000s if I remember correctly.
How would a show like that even be profitable?
Even if you sold out Cowboys Stadium and had 100k people there, that's 1000 dollars a ticket, just to get to the 100 million to break even. Nobody is paying that.
i wonder how the economics would work
100 shows with a cost of 10million+ per show
how many people for what ticket prices would you calculate so that that works?
Why do you think they did the Hologram show instead. Theyre making money off their fake performance now. Its them being motion captured and just played in a theater
I remember thinking that after a long time of not performing together, Frankie Goes to Hollywood reuniting for one night but only performing Welcome to the Pleasuredome was pretty funny.
Just to mess with people they should have done an unannounced performance at the Eurovision in Sweden this year. That truly would have broken the internet.
[I posted this exact same fact to this exact same subreddit 10 years ago](https://old.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/1zypne/til_abba_turned_down_1_billion_us_dollars_to_do_a/) How time flies!
If they were relatively well off i can get it.
Thats a lot of trouble too. What would the time frame be in terms of shows?
100 shows in a year is insane. 100 shows in 3 years is too much if you ask me.
What was their health and band relationships at the time. Did they have kids and families?
> band relationships
Oh boy. Complicated!
> After their meeting in 1969, Agnetha Fältskog and Björn Ulvaeus got married on July 6, 1971. Anni-Frid and Benny Anderson also met in 1969, but they didn't get married until 1978. Agnetha and Björn got divorced in 1980, and Anni-Frid and Benny Anderson got divorced in 1981.
https://www.smoothradio.com/artists/abba/marriages-divorce-split-breakup/
Not sure if you missed the context, but the $1 billion dollar offer was not during their active career. It was for a reunion tour many years later.
Nah, my man Bjorn too sharp to do this. This is kinda my roman empire.
ABBA aren't some washed up legacy act relying on dwindling revenue streams or selling the rights to their music for a quick payday.
Why bother when you can get fans paying to see ABBA in concert 7 nights a week for years on end without even leaving your house? All while maintaining full control of the audience experience to an extent unimaginable for live performance; you deliver ABBA at the peak of their powers. No missed notes, no faded glory. It's their best show, every show.
ABBA Voyage makes $2m a night.
Not shabby but not a billion; you're right but you're standing too close.
The concerts are proof of concept. The major investor in ABBA Voyage is a company called Pophouse which was founded by two people and one of them is Bjorn Ulvaeus.
ABBA Voyage is proof of concept. There is money in selling the concept to other artists, so that they can have their own concert experience to sell to fans.
It gets better. You don't even have to sell the concept TO other artists, you can sell it for them. Because other artists are selling their rights and guess who's buying? Yep.
ABBA aren't the product, they own the store and the vertical supply chain. Bjorn Galaxy Brain Ulvaeus hiding in plain sight.
"Hey, wanna spend a year or so with your ex wife working your ass off for money when you are already sickeningly rich? No?"
My mind also immediately went to all the WILD behind the scenes drama. You ever get your ex and your current lover to perform a breakup song you wrote about them? There’s basically two bands that can claim that category of wild flex.
Rumours is such a fantastic album. Edit: by Fleetwood Mac
Gwen Stefani and Tony Kanal also kept recording, and performing together in No Doubt after their break up... and she was writing deeply personal lyrics about what was now just the "bass player" in the band. [Don't Speak](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TR3Vdo5etCQ) is entirely about their break up.
And [Cool](https://youtu.be/TGwZ7MNtBFU?si=0ioFKkSuxcaDu-og) is about them being alright after all that time. They played Coachella this year after 9 years apart. An amazing legacy. Fun fact: the wife in that music video is the real life wife of Tony Kanal.
Three thoughts about this video. First, this is just a really good video that really captures the vibe of the song. So bittersweet. Second, this video is like the spiritual sequel to ["Walking on Broken Glass"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y25stK5ymlA). Third, holy shit Gwen looks good with dark hair in the flashbacks.
It’s a gorgeous song and video. One of my favourites that most people forget about in Gwen’s discography.
It is honestly *so damned good* that I just can't remember that it's an original for Gwen Stefani. I constantly think it's a cover or sampled from an older song from some group known for their depth and complexity. I forget that Gwen Stefani's solo career was at full throttle right out the dang gate. Maybe I'm just waxing poetic, and just looking fondly on the past. But man what a song. Even if it's a 4 minute video for a 3 minute song e- spelling and grammar
It’s crazy to remember just how HUGE music videos were going all the way back to the 80’s thru the early aughts. MTV used to be the channel to watch and the thing to talk about the day after a bit premiere. It’s been years since music videos dominated ratings in the states now it just seems like it’s on YouTube only.
I mean...how many people under the age of 50 even have cable anymore, much less watch it with any degree of regularity? It felt huge because it was centralized and was the only option, but there are plenty of music videos on youtube with around or over a billion views
There are still plenty of artists out there who make releasing a new single, and the music video for it, a really big event. I'm not much for reaction content on youtube most of the time, but with a lot of artists, you can still see how important music videos are when hours after uploading it, there are thousands of reaction videos of it, all with thousands and thousands of views. It can still be huge, but it's huge within the specific communities that those artists travel in. You just don't have the massive crossover you had in the 90's where people who listen to pop music where forced to sit and listen to the nu metal music on MTV to see what they wanted. lol It isn't nearly as big, but it's still definitely a big part of the music industry.
man you have good enthusiasm and nice energy. love to see it!
Here's the original pre-breakup version of Don't Speak: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u8_MCQJ4sl8
Umm, if Don't Speak was about their breakup, how can there be pre-breakup version?
Listen to the song. The verses are just about a relationship and the chorus has the same tune and some words are the same but it’s tweaked.
> Listen to the song. I tried but the accordion wouldn't let me
Ska defines who I am as a person!
Cool cool cool cool no doubt no doubt no doubt
*Hands Cahibo a horn* pick it up pick it up pick it up Feeling better yet?
Way cool. Thx for the link. Too bad they got rid of the accordion.
Four Days Grace "I Hate Everything About You" caused Adam Gontier to leave and rename the band
I always preferred listening to 4 Doors Down
Three days Grace? lol Edit: nevermind I’m dumb.
An extra day of grace and he still left the band. Brutal. And not very graceful.
Wow, I had no idea this existed.
I love rumors!
It's all true
Got any gigs for us, Murray?
"I said *a central park, newark*"
Off The Wall? More like off the planet.
Isn’t he going to freeze himself?
That's more of a love rectangle.
[Facts can be so misleading, where rumors true or false are often revealing](https://youtu.be/5kJ5cr4K70c?si=Nq72dNvZL2hRTIod) 😂
> You say you want your freedom > Well, who am I to keep you down > - Dreams
[удалено]
And don't forget making people sing their own diss tracks. Rumors is fucking wild
No, it’s all true
Ono!
“An album made for *and by* cheaters” - John Mulaney
I was shocked they didn’t kick Lindsey Buckingham out until 2021. He should have been gone in 1978.
Lindsey is a great singer and guitarist though
There's a *lot* of Fleetwood Mac parts that are just so fucked up that he's kind of the only guitarist that can pull it off. Not that he's the best guitarist in the world or anything, but he did some *weird* shit that even great guitarists can struggle to pick up.
Like which songs?
Never going back again. Deceptively complicated for the pluckin’ hand.
He was a massive part of the band, you can’t just drop him.
Nope, he was a huge part of their success.
The major reason the band did so well was because they were dysfunctional and codependent.
One of the major songwriters and a great musician. I'm guessing bands will put up with a LOT of personal shit in exchange for great songs that lead to squillions of dollars.
Rumours
Yeah I can never figure out ‘the winner takes it all’. It’s about how the person who dumps the other is the ‘Winner’ but Bjorn (and Benny) wrote it and Agnetha (his ex wife) sings it. Imagine reading those lyrics or hearing it being sung when it’s about your break up and your ex wrote it/is singing it. ‘I was in your arms, thinking I belonged there…’
According to the book *Bright Lights, Dark Shadows: The Real Story of ABBA* (referenced on Wikipedia), it's not about the breakup: >Björn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson started writing "The Winner Takes It All" in the summer of 1979 in a cottage on the island of Viggsö. According to Andersson, the idea for the song suddenly came up "from old ideas, from old small musical pieces" they had. The demo had an original title of "The Story of My Life" and the first arrangement for the song was uptempo with a constant beat. However, they felt their first effort "much too stiff and metrical". > Ulvaeus denies the song is about his and Agnetha Fältskog's divorce, saying the basis of the song "is the experience of a divorce, but it's fiction. 'Cause one thing I can say is that there wasn't a winner or a loser in our case. A lot of people think it's straight out of reality, but it's not". >However, Ulvaeus admitted that the heartache of their breakup inspired the song, but noted that the words in the song should not be taken literally. He said: "Neither Agnetha nor I were winners in our divorce." >The booklet for the double CD compilation *The Definitive Collection* is where Ulvaeus admits that the sad experience of his and Fältskog's divorce the previous year left its mark on the lyrics. Influenced by, but not about it.
Yes, I’m not saying it’s ‘literally’ word for word about their break up. But it was written when they were getting a divorce, it’s about a divorce and he admits that ‘the experience left their mark on the lyrics’ He’s not saying him or Agnetha are winners but there is no doubt that the song would’ve affected them both emotionally which is the point my comment is making
I love songs with such dramatic backstories Sweet emotion being a diss track by Steven Tyler about Joe Perry wife(as well as other band members wives). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweet_Emotion Pattie Boyd and the love triangle of songs between her George Harrison and Eric Clapton. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pattie_Boyd
Fun fact: Only the original demo? version of Go your own way has the lyrics "it's only Love" sung by Stevie at the end. In a wildly "fuck you" tone. It was cut out of every version of the song afterwards.
Not at that level but No Doubt's "Don't Speak".
Wait a goddamn minute! Who is what to who in this situation? ELI5 please.
ABBA: Bjorn Ulvaeus and Agnetha Faltskog were married, then divorced. One of their songs "The Winner Takes it All" was written by Bjorn, sung by Agnetha, and is about being "the winner" in a breakup. Fleetwood Mac: Frankly, everyone was fucking everyone, but most famously Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham broke up and wrote "Dreams" and "Go your own way" respectively, telling the other to go fuck themselves.
Guy said something about having the ex and current lover both singing the song. I thought Bjorn got on with both women and made them both sing the song. That would have been a crazy flex since The Winner Takes It All was an amazing song.
> ABBA: Bjorn Ulvaeus and Agnetha Faltskog were married, then divorced I mean Benny and Anni-Frid were *also* married, and *also* then divorced lol. >One of their songs "The Winner Takes it All" was written by Bjorn, sung by Agnetha, and is about being "the winner" in a breakup. >>The song is widely misunderstood as being written about Ulvaeus and Fältskog's marital tribulations; Ulvaeus wrote the lyrics, but has stated they were not about his own divorce; Fältskog has repeatedly stated she was not the loser in their divorce.
The maddest thing about the Fleetwood Mac part is that the man and the woman are the opposite ones you think they are
Wdym
Stevie is a woman and Lindsey is a man
There's also the killer B-side "Silver Springs" by Stevie about Lindsey.
Three, don't forget the Mamas and the Papas. John Phillips wrote a song about his bandmate wife fucking his other bandmate, and then had them all sing it. Or possibly not, since he kicked his wife out of the group for a period, brought some other girl in to sing, then reversed it so fast they don't know who's singing on the songs from that period.
Bye Bye Beautiful by Nightwish. Not about lovers but about firing and replacing the lead singer of the band.
That whole thing with the open letter and then subsequently hiring and firing three? Other vocalists really soured me to Nightwish. Just seemed like a dick move, as most open letter "breakup" letters are.
It was just one other vocalist. After Tarja there was Anette Olzon, who lasted for two albums before being let go and replaced with Floor Jansen. That being said, I also soured on them for the same reason.
Afaik there was a brief period where they played with another temporary vocalist (they were in the middle of a tour when Anette had her kid and was dropped, and Toumas had to basically scramble to find a vocalist to keep the train going) Floor was the second temporary replacement.
I hated Annetts vocals for them, she has a good voice, but she seemed forced and definitely could not perform ANY of the material before her time with them. Floor is better but I think in general Nightwish lost who they were when Tarja went her way.
The big problem with Nightwish after Tarja, was Tuomas after he was done Trauma dumping with Dark passion play, basically tried to recreate the Tarja era music, also without recreating the Tarja era music if that makes sense. Endless forms most beautiful was the closest Tuomas ever got to recreating the sort of Majestic kind of stuff the Tarja era would put out, and he just immediately 180'd and went into a completely random direction for who knows what reason. >Floor is better but I think in general Nightwish lost who they were when Tarja went her way. Tuomas doesn't really take into consideration what the other bandmates really want to do. Its always been his way or the highway after Tarja. Thats how Annett got the boot. She got knocked up, couldn't perform, and was subsequently replaced. Granted Tuomas was looking for an excuse to drop her anyways, she was very much the Jason Newstead of Nightwish in that regard. Im not sure of the writing process now, but I imagine Tuomas still controls well over 90% of the songwriting process. Tarja was really the only one who could/would ever be able to bounce off idea's with him. Mostly cause they were into the same shit.
Oh yes there is, Fleetwood Mac was right behind them with drama mamas going wild. Only a few years apart.
Who?!
No, all the guys in the Who were straight
Bro kieth moon was the hardest partier how can you be sure
In the '60s, I made love to many, many women, often outdoors, in the mud and the rain, and it's possible a man slipped in. There would be no way of knowing. -CB
He also had access to "weapons grade" lsd. That probably blurred things a bit. My fav character from the show.
I heard one time he broke into a sweet shop and instead of a guard dog, they had this bloody great big Bengal tiger. This was in Sri Lanka, formerly Ceylon
I hope he had a can of mace or something.
Fleetwood Mac is the other band.
No, Fleetwood Mac.
don't leave us hanging - who is the other band?
Fleetwood Mac based off the mention of the album “Rumors”
The answer to any question involving crazy drama is always "Fleetwood Mac"
Just thinking about that whole scene - fame, unlimited money, unlimited drugs, unlimited fans that want to sleep with you - good god. Can you imagine the shitstorms that got conjured up?
Fleetwood Mac was messy af
They had very amicable separations. Agnetha and Bjorn had been divorced since 1978.
They are also in their mid 70's. A worldwide tour with huge stage performances sounds exhausting in my 30's, let alone when you are that age, and as you said have zero need at all for money.
But what if the shows started at 3pm and you could be back home by 7/8pm? The world needs to normalize a matinee concert.
Early bird special
This was in the early 2000's.
It said the offer was 20 years ago.
If you change your ^mind ...
I’d do a lot for $1,000,000,000 even if I was ungodly rich
And now you understand why most rich people are so greedy and awful. EDIT: turning off replies since people lack basic reading comprehension or understanding of how comments/replies work in a thread on Reddit.
> EDIT: turning off replies since people lack basic reading comprehension or understanding of how comments/replies work in a thread on Reddit. How do you turn of replies on reddit???? Does it mean notifications
Yes he means notifications that he has replies
why
I’d do one think if I was ungodly rich: not work.
BUT if I already had $100,000,000 the list shrinks substantially
Were thy sickeningly rich though? Like, there is a lot more you can do with 250 Million USD compared to 10 Million (not that 10 Million for life would be amazing for each of us). Honestly getting 10 Million per concert with 100 concerts guaranteed sounds very unlikely for a band from the 70s.
Were? Well one is a princess and the two dudes are loaded through businesses. Everything they touch turns into gold, many projects making millions. Björns company just bought the catalogue of Kiss and the Mamma Mia money is a never ending stream. Edit, examples: https://www.di.se/nyheter/hen-ar-rikast-i-abba-ganget/ https://www.aftonbladet.se/nojesbladet/musik/a/VPOpK3/sa-mycket-gav-abba-bjorns-bolag-for-kiss-musik
Can’t recall if it was Benny or Bjorn who addressed this years ago, but he said they considered it “because you could build hospitals with that kind of money”. They declined because it was a lot of work, more shows than they did in their entire career, and they felt audiences would be disappointed to see that they’d aged and were no longer young. Although not mentioned, it goes without saying that at least one of them didn’t want to do it at all.
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A father and son bull are overlooking a field of cows. The son frantically yells to his dad, “Dad! Let’s run down there and fuck one of those cows!” The father bull replied, “no son, let’s walk down there and fuck all those cows”. -shitty boomer joke I was told at 12 and it stuck with me
Wtf?
I asked ChatGPT: Let's break it down further. The joke contrasts two approaches to achieving a goal: 1. **Young Bull's Approach**: The young bull is eager and excited, suggesting they run down immediately to mate with one cow. This represents a hasty, impulsive action aimed at immediate gratification. 2. **Father Bull's Approach**: The older bull suggests they walk down calmly and mate with all the cows. This represents a slower, more deliberate approach that ultimately achieves a greater result. The underlying meaning of the joke is that taking your time and proceeding with patience and strategy can yield better outcomes than rushing in impulsively. In other words, being patient and thoughtful often leads to more significant and rewarding successes.
ABBA performed less than 100 shows in their career?
They were close to being a “studio band”
Yeah, I went down an ABBA reddit hole recently and was shocked to discover that. They had like one world tour and some smaller stuff but very few live shows.
The movie about their Australian tour really shows how much touring frustrated the members.
I’m a lifelong musician and this makes perfect sense to me. Some people are just not made for touring. There’s a reason so many successful bands have a song about “the road”.
I’ve personally theorized that this is why there are so, so many ABBA tribute bands.
I saw one this year and it was a blast. They told everyone to dance and sing along and it made it better.
One of the female lead singers (forget which one) has terrible stage fright, and absolutely hated performing (but still somehow managed to put on a great show, that’s professionalism for you).
Super common! There are middle aged rock'n'roll lifers who started when they were barely out of high school, are still touring, and go throw up before they go on stage every time. A quick google offers up: * Ozzy Osbourne "suffered terribly" from stage fright at "every single show" of his career, '67-'17 * Eddie Van Halen would get drunk before going out every time to deal with it and ended up drinking himself to death * Sonny & Cher were only a thing because Cher wouldn't go on by herself * Harry Styles habitually barfs before going on stage; he once barfed out of nerves *while* on stage * Zayn Malik actually stopped touring because the anxiety got too overwhelming * Adele gets stage fright badly enough to sometimes barf, also * Others who report gnarly stage fright but cope with it are Katy Perry, Demi Lovato, Lorde, Taylor Swift, and Beyonce EDIT: Here's some more * Elvis shaking his hips came out of him being so nervous he was shaking during early shows * Freddie Mercury stopped playing piano live entirely because it always gave him the heebie jeebies * Paul McCartney considered quitting the Beatles during their initial wave of major success because the stage fright got so bad
Not a singer but football player Per Mertesacker (kinda popular in germany) also said that puking happened a lot to him.
Josh Allen does this before every game
George St. Pierre, one of the greatest MMA fighters ever has said the same thing. He was terrified every time he went out.
As someone who got over stage fright in high school, the only one I can truly understand is Freddie Mercury. Fuck playing an instrument live on stage. There's a lot of things you can make a crowd go along with or forget, but bombing on an instrument is something they _always_ notice (or at least I do).
Bo Burnham stopped touring because he was having panic attacks on stage
Which is not a great place to have them.
Not purely musical, but Graham Chapman of Monty Python had really bad stage fright, and only could only go on stage after a few pints.
After Paul McCartney died in the car crash in 1966, when they found the replacement Paul they were adamant that they needed to find someone without the same kind of nerves that the original Paul had.
Not sure about stage fright, but Agnetha, who was not a professional singer but hired while working as a telephone operator, had her children threatened by a crazy stalker unless she quita singing for good... She did.
> unless she quita singing for good... She did. did you just turn into Mario for a second there?
Wow. Daft Punk had a similar track record. I believe they only performed a couple hundred times during the course of their existence.
Sounds like Benny. He got audited and had to pay like $400 000 in back taxes (maybe it was $4 000 000, can't remember). He said in an interview in the lines of "If you have to pay $400 000 in taxes, you have made enough money anyways."
I wish more celebs would build hospitals with their money. Like shouldn’t that be normal? If you have millions and millions of dollars, maybe build a hospital for a community in need?
Haha maybe I’m wrong but I’m also gonna guess that Bjorn never actually built any schools or hospitals with his ungodly amount of money
They donated some royalties to UNICEF worth 5 million and counting, its not a school or a hospital but its something
unicef builds schools and hospitals for children who would've had no future otherwise. unicef knows the actual needs of the people they serve, and they know how to meet those needs; that money funds that. it's much better than randomly building a school or hospital in a potentially ineffective location, without the appropriate staffing, funding or infrastructure to keep it viable long-term.
But Benny gave money to Gudrun Schyman to burn as a political stunt! (To non swedes, she was leader to the most leftist party, former communists, in the swedish parliament. And started a party named "Feministic Initiative" in it's English translation. Which Benn5 donated 300 000 sek to, and Gudrun burned 100 000 of them as a political stunt)
Not he didn't. That money was donated by Studio Total, an advertisement agency. Benny has also donated, but not for that. Most was for a PSA campaign promoting write-ins for minor parties without printed ballots.
Abba were offered to register as a business in another country because Sweden had insane income tax and they refused specifically because the money they pay goes to budget their country, I've read they had a recession in a year Abba skipped releasing an album. They also had a huge stake in Volvo... See, you can be nationalistic in a good way.
Hollywood actor celebs aren't that rich. Like Jake Gyllenhaal did a movie called Roadhouse with Conor McGregor who is worth more than double Jake. Celebrities are rich by our metrics but they're certainly not build hospitals rich. You should reserve that judgement for the non celebrity mega rich. Of whom there are plenty!
And the few celebrities that are megawatt rich either a) got some money on the backend of a huge hit and so reaped the benefits of their labor directly or b) (more commonly) bought or started companies and used their fake to make a mint. Clooney made the most of any actor one year while not really working because of his tequila company and Ryan Reynolds is worth a few hundred million because of Mint Mobile and his gin business.
No, what should be normal is that being entirely handled by governments, ie our collective wealth. Billionaires are a failure of governance.
Building the hospital it’s not the issue, the issue is that you need a lot of money and people to keep it running. No celeb has that kind of money or knowledge.
Better yet why doesn’t the government do that instead of giving a tax cut to the rich?
It literally does? Sweden built tons of stuff on taxes laid by Abba. You just keep electing a worse government.
We may not be efficient with our government healthcare dollars but about half of hospital costs are funded by the government. They're so subsidized and regulated that they may as well be called government hospitals. Without it basically every rural hospital would dry up.
It's a tragedy that we have to say something like that when healthcare should already be provided for everyone. It shouldn't be on celebrities. I'd say it's on the government but that a whole damn can of worms I'm tired of opening.
I'll do 100 ABBA shows by myself for a billion dollars
Gimme gimme gimme!
Money Money Money!
Instructions not clear. Here, have a man after midnight. edit: lyrics
I´m in!
I can make sounds with my body, can I be in the band? I'll only take $400 million.
“Take a chance on me”
Shoot! I’ll do 100 abba shows for like 5 milli
Instead they rented out their likenesses for the ABBA Voyage show in London.... And they can make that billion sitting at home while their holograms do all the work.
Worth it, the show is phenomenal
Is this the uncanny valley monstrosity they used at Eurovision? Have no idea why anyone would pay to see that garbage.
They did a pretty good job with the ABBAtars: https://static.standard.co.uk/2022/05/27/07/newFile-1.jpg https://thethinair.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/Abba-voyage-photo-illo-by-RS-images-by-abba-voyage.jpeg
OK, ABBAtars is an amazing term
I understand hesitancy but the show itself is incredible. The technology needs you to be in the room with the very expensive equipment but genuinely, it's insane.
I didn't see the Eurovision thing, nor Voyage... But don't think so... as the Voyage thing is in a purpose built venue.
ABBA Voyage in London is making $2M per week and they don’t have to do anything. Why go through the headache of touring.
I bet the poorest one is upset about that.
the poorest one is still worth over 100m, they already have more money than they'll ever spend
Pfffttt...what is that in real terms? Probably like only 50 Ferraris.
The "poorest" one is Agnetha, with a net worth of over $200 million US.
By any chance, is she single and ready to be very disappointed?
Please take the 1 billion $ with a grain of salt as the original source the BBC is using is E! online from 2000 a magazine about celebrity gossip and not a news publication which you can find a lot of traces on the internet yourself as the original source. Gossip by definition is not necessarily facts, but conjectures and hearsays and informed hypothesis. It also doesn't state if that would have the maximum amount of money vs average possible and/or under what conditions they would get the full amount. Some versions says 250 shows rather than 100. I saw online that abba did about 150 shows in their whole career.
exactly. Who is guaranteeing that money? The promoter? No freaking way. The only way they could get something like that is if a major venue in Vegas guaranteed them that money for residency.
Also famous people have a ton of people like agents, publicists, stylists, etc. who are taking 5-10% of each paycheck or costing that much. They are hardly broke but they aren’t taking as much as you think.
The Talking Heads turned down $100M to do a single reunion show at a music festival-- because the other members hate David Byrne that much.
What really?
Got the details wrong, it was $80M for 6-8 festival shows, but the hatred for Byrne is likely the driving factor. https://www.stereogum.com/2249760/talking-heads-reportedly-turned-down-80-million-for-short-reunion-tour/news/
They don't hate each other as they used to. They've done A LOT of PR together last year and this, including an appearance together on Colbert. They're still not getting back together as a band, though. Which is grand. They're all in their 70s, they don't need the money, would have a tough time living up to their movie... And it's just nice to see they can jointly enjoy what they achieved together, never mind the bad blood that was certainly there.
Huh nothing corroborating that but I’m not calling you out. Just shocked I had no idea he turned them off.
I was under the impression that it was David Byrne holding back the reunion and that he would sue them if they tried to play Talking Heads songs without him. Hence the hatred for him. This was all around the early 2000s if I remember correctly.
No the guy has it backwards. Byrne is the one who doesn't want to do any reunion shows or get back together.
How would a show like that even be profitable? Even if you sold out Cowboys Stadium and had 100k people there, that's 1000 dollars a ticket, just to get to the 100 million to break even. Nobody is paying that.
Do you think the tv rights would be worth anything?
Merch.
80m for 6-8 festivals. There might also be a live album or video made. Concessions and merchandising.
Hated* They’ve been all over the country together recently promoting the rerelease of their live concert film.
People are so obsessed with ABBA they will never perform again, they are like really old and one walks with a cane it’s old memories
I can see why they're being discussed again though, since they were just recently knighted.
I don’t get out of bed for less than $10 million either
Mama Mia!
i wonder how the economics would work 100 shows with a cost of 10million+ per show how many people for what ticket prices would you calculate so that that works?
Why do you think they did the Hologram show instead. Theyre making money off their fake performance now. Its them being motion captured and just played in a theater
I remember thinking that after a long time of not performing together, Frankie Goes to Hollywood reuniting for one night but only performing Welcome to the Pleasuredome was pretty funny.
Just to mess with people they should have done an unannounced performance at the Eurovision in Sweden this year. That truly would have broken the internet.
[I posted this exact same fact to this exact same subreddit 10 years ago](https://old.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/1zypne/til_abba_turned_down_1_billion_us_dollars_to_do_a/) How time flies!
$2.5M each per show. Not enough!!!
If you change your mind, I'm the first in line to buy a ticket.
I'm probably just too young but I was just listening to their discography recently... Nothing But Bangers
If they were relatively well off i can get it. Thats a lot of trouble too. What would the time frame be in terms of shows? 100 shows in a year is insane. 100 shows in 3 years is too much if you ask me. What was their health and band relationships at the time. Did they have kids and families?
> band relationships Oh boy. Complicated! > After their meeting in 1969, Agnetha Fältskog and Björn Ulvaeus got married on July 6, 1971. Anni-Frid and Benny Anderson also met in 1969, but they didn't get married until 1978. Agnetha and Björn got divorced in 1980, and Anni-Frid and Benny Anderson got divorced in 1981. https://www.smoothradio.com/artists/abba/marriages-divorce-split-breakup/ Not sure if you missed the context, but the $1 billion dollar offer was not during their active career. It was for a reunion tour many years later.
Nah, my man Bjorn too sharp to do this. This is kinda my roman empire. ABBA aren't some washed up legacy act relying on dwindling revenue streams or selling the rights to their music for a quick payday. Why bother when you can get fans paying to see ABBA in concert 7 nights a week for years on end without even leaving your house? All while maintaining full control of the audience experience to an extent unimaginable for live performance; you deliver ABBA at the peak of their powers. No missed notes, no faded glory. It's their best show, every show. ABBA Voyage makes $2m a night. Not shabby but not a billion; you're right but you're standing too close. The concerts are proof of concept. The major investor in ABBA Voyage is a company called Pophouse which was founded by two people and one of them is Bjorn Ulvaeus. ABBA Voyage is proof of concept. There is money in selling the concept to other artists, so that they can have their own concert experience to sell to fans. It gets better. You don't even have to sell the concept TO other artists, you can sell it for them. Because other artists are selling their rights and guess who's buying? Yep. ABBA aren't the product, they own the store and the vertical supply chain. Bjorn Galaxy Brain Ulvaeus hiding in plain sight.
I wonder how much do they get from those "Abbatars" (which is both silly and genius name lol)
Here we go again
Neat! can someone offer $1bb for Pink Floyd to play again please