Abba Book:

Abba: Thank You for the Music: The Stories Behind Every Song Reviews:
'Opinions' behind every song
2009-10-03 - 'Opinions' should be more appropriate for the title. While the book may look enticing at a glance, once one goes deeper into it the obvious subjective tone screams out loudly. If the author did not like the song, he comments on it clearly. Therefore, the objectiveness one expects to find here, which would otherwise give one a true feeling for each song's background, is sadly missing. Many songs do not even have a background story assigned to them, so the author simply (as if to fill up space -- after all he HAS to comment on all songs)has to give his sometimes banal point of view. Luckily, I bought this book at a bargain table of my local bookstore and paid little for it, so no regrets here. If you paid full price...I am so sorry!

If you are an ABBA fan you may place this book at the bottom of your already enomrous ABBA library. if you, however, are somewhat new to ABBA (is anyone left who is???), I would better suggest other books by authors such as Carl Magnus Palm or John Tobler.

Well...
2006-08-04 - I don't really like the book to much. Here is why:
1. Some of the pictures are backwards and are not in order. For example, on a page talking about 1981, on the same page there would be a picture from 1975.
2. The "stories behind every song" are only opinions.
3. Robert Scott doesn't sound like much of an ABBA fan.
If you are looking for a great ABBA book, you should get "From ABBA to Mamma Mia" or "ABBA the Book."


Misnomer
2003-08-05 - This book does not tell "the story behind every song" as the cover claims. It is, rather, Scott's own review of every song. The reviews are chaptered by album. There is some lightweight "scene setting" early on - basically, potted histories of the four group members - and some preamble before the individual reviews in each chapter.

As with so many other books purporting to be authorities on ABBA, this is littered with inaccuracies and tedious, regurgitated "factoids". To his credit, Scott has tried to inject some humour into his writing but the results are merely glib and the tone throughout oscillates between sneering and fawning. His instinct to avoid taking his subject too seriously would be laudable if it weren't for the sheer laziness apparent in this book. Sleeve notes appear to have been ignored or, at most, speed-read. He even contradicts himself on a number of occasions: e.g., having acknowledged Benny's decision to quit lyric writing after a few early howlers, he goes on to castigate Benny for lyrics he never wrote. Also, the identity of the lead vocalists on songs is occasionally inaccurate - and sometimes confused within a single paragraph.

The blurb makes much of the "rare" photographs used in the book. True, some of them have not previously been published. Mostly, there is a very good reason for that. They are clearly the also-rans from otherwise successful shoots. These "rare shots" catch their subject mid-blink or they are badly composed, images that other picture editors would have bypassed. None of them has any historic value. Even so, it wouldn't have been too difficult to arrange them chronologically to illustrate the period being "discussed" in each chapter but absolutely no effort has been made on that front either. The cover is sloppily designed and the internal layout is dull and dated.

There is very little on which to recommend this book. Anybody wanting to find out more about ABBA should check the following titles: "Bright Light, Dark Shadows" (Carl Magnus Palm); "ABBA - The Complete Recording Sessions" (Carl Magnus Palm); "ABBA The Book" (Jean Marie Potiez); "From ABBA to Mamma Mia" (Anders Hanser/Carl Magnus Palm).

ABBA completists should do what I did: find this book in a bargain bin.