Your trusted source

Swedish pop icons Abba announced their long-anticipated reunion on Thursday, September 2, after almost 40 years apart, The Independent reported.

Following the announcement this evening in London, the group – made up of Benny Andersson, Anni-Frid (Frida) Lyngstad, Agnetha Fälskog and Björn Ulvaeus also unveiled two new singles: “I Still Have Faith In You” and “Don’t Shut Me Down".

Both songs will appear on their forthcoming, 10-track album, Voyage. The album, which will be the group’s first studio album since “The Visitors”, will be released on 5 November 2021 via Polydor/Universal Music.

Abba also announced details of a state-of-the-art virtual concert series in which all four members of the band will appear on stage digitally. The group will appear with a live 10-piece band, in a purpose-built arena in London from 27 May 2022.

The group teamed up with the Star Wars creator George Lucas’s studio to develop digital representations of themselves using this first-of-a-kind, “revolutionary” technology. A preview of what the digital versions of Abba look like can be seen in the accompanying video for “I Still Have Faith In You”.

The avatars were created following weeks of motion-capture and performance techniques with the four band members and an 850-strong team from Industrial Light & Magic, the company founded by Lucas, in what is the company’s first foray into music.

The group began work on the concert first, before finding themselves back in the studio in Stockholm recording new music soon after. The group worked together at Andersson’s studio, Riksmixningsverket, in Stockholm, Sweden.

The concert will open at the Abba Arena, a state-of-the-art 3,000-capacity arena located at Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in London.

Abba’s last studio album was released in 1981 while their last new music came in the form of the 1982 single, “Under Attack”. Three previously unreleased songs were made public a decade later in 1993 and 1994.  The band shot to international fame in 1974 after representing Sweden in the Eurovision Song Contest with the track “Waterloo”.