Mamma mia, here we go again, except this time it will be different. Abba will be back on stage next Friday to promote their reunion album, Voyage, with a stadium show that circumvents all the old jokes about rock dinosaurs by using cutting-edge holographic technology to capture them singing the songs, while retro-styling them to look as they did in their 1970s heyday. So they won’t actually be there at all.
The production team behind this show breathlessly exclaimed that five weeks of filming was enough to capture the “soul” of Abba. A mixed reception for the album itself will not prevent the faithful from flocking to the custom-built stadium in east London for the six-month run, where their avatars will perform alongside a live band. Ever since they won the 1974 Eurovision song contest with Waterloo, Abba have been critic-proof. “No thank you for the music” is how the Guardian received their latest album. But everybody knows Abba’s tunes. The jukebox musical Mamma Mia! is the West End’s sixth longest-running show, and the film based on it remains the 20th highest-grossing film at the UK box office.
