Packaged Promoted Reviewed
Carl Magnus Palm
ABBA On Record – Packaged Promoted Reviewed is the essential companion to Carl Magnus Palm’s ABBA – The Complete Recording Sessions, which explored ABBA’s own creativity and the stories behind the songs. ABBA On Record tells the reader what happened after the music had left the studio: single by single, album by album it describes how the iconic sleeves were put together, examines how ABBA’s singles were selected, explores how the record companies worked with ABBA releases in presenting them to the record-buying public, shows what kind of success they enjoyed, and presents a selection of review excerpts to give a flavour of how the singles and albums were received buy the media at the time.
ABBA On Record is based on extensive research and interviews with designers, photographers, record company employees and people involved with the creation of the album sleeves, many of whom have never been interviewed at length about their ABBA experiences. The book pressents a fresh angle on the group’s story and is a compeling stud of the arc of a popuar music phenomenon during the music industry’s peak years.
ABBA On Record also features additional chapters, one of which details the making of the group’s comeback album Voyage, using the diary format familiar from ABBA – The Complete Recording Sessions. Perhaps even more exciting is the exploration of the so-called Michael B. Tretow Tapes: hours of unheard ABBA recordings from the archives of ABBA’s trusted sound engineer. These on-the-side tapes captured what was going on during ABBA’s recording sessions in real time and contain alternate versions of familiar songs, previously unheard tunes that were never recorded properly, and more.
Published:
Published: 15 March 2024
See also:
ABBA Omnibus 