ABBA announce their first studio album of new material in 39 years Voyage and ground-breaking concert series

Unlikely to be competitive in these streaming days.

David you know very little where music is concerned. Abba will not only have another #1 single but Album as well.

You are obviously clueless if you don’t think the single wont hit #1

I was thinking the same thing, however with so much publicity surrounding it maybe this time talent will enter the charts and do well amongst the diluted dribble that's in the charts lately.
Fingers crossed. :)

You're the one who's 'clueless' buddy. I can't wait to come back here and see your response when ABBA dethrone the mighty Sheerhan, which will happen after freezes over.

Err no Sarah, you are clearly deluded if you think there's any chance of them even entering the top 10, never mind number one. In fact, I'd go further and say they'll be lucky to get into the top 40 with this song. Might happen, but very unlikely. Everyone in the top 40 these days is in their teens or 20s, so the chances of a band from the 70's/ early 80's getting another number one single in the streaming era is practically nil. Come back next week and apologise.

I agree with you about the Single's chart , but i believe there Album will be no.1 for sure....it's gonna sell like crazy in all formats....Tim from Canada...

A Bigger prediction from me is that Voyage will be the best selling album of the year 2021...ABBA's Fan buy there music and is most likely going to be on Vinyl....Can't wait to see the first week of sales for this NEW ABBA Album....it's most likely gonna sell like an ADELE album....We will see in November 2021...bye

Best group to come out of Sweden is Roxette. I personally do not like Abba, their music is too girlish for me. Ed has been #1 for a while and with all the buzz surrounding Abba and the new single(s) my bet is it will go to #1. Their Album has pre-orders of over 40,000. I think they have enough fan base to get them to the top. For sure, if you are correct I would love to owe you an apology, hey I'll give you two, but I am usually right when I think something is going to happen. We can cry together next week.

Heritage / catalogue acts like this have proven time and time again that they don't shift Singles in the digital era. Look at Kylie, Queen, Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan, Paul Weller (twice), ACDC to name a few. All big acts with a debut long before 1990 and a #1 album in the last 2 years (most with all-new material). None made a dent on the Singles chart. Or at least nowhere near the top 40. At the end of the CD, if Abba had released a new album around 2005, they might have a single at the bottom end of the top 20. In fact they did! A re-issue of Waterloo. Likewise, I doubt either of these Abba singles will come anywhere close to the top 40, certainly not in the first week - despite the publicity. It's just not a popular format fot that type of artist anymore. The music / sound is almost immaterial.

With 40,000 pre-sale albums, and current album chart patterns of 1-week #1s, another #1 is basically guarnteed and by a massive margin. Probably enough to outsell the rest of the top 5 put together. The numbers are new information to me in your post. Those sort of numbers in recent years have been enough to be the fastest selling of the year to date, even as late in the year as November (Kylie and ACDC as mentioned above).

I'd love to be wrong for the singles (for them to be higher), but I see them being between 60 and 75 at best, dropping out of the top 75 the following week if they enter at all. Maybe a few weeks top 100 action before re-entering slightly higher in the week of the album release.

If anything will benefit from this, it is the legendary Gold. Expect a return to the top 10 before the year is out thanks to this publicity.

I think on the Singles chart, Sir Ed will drop purely from ACR even without strong competition. As Bengy says, Abba will not be competitive on streaming and that's pretty much what the Singles chart is these days (over 95% streaming). I doubt the singles will hit the top 50 in the first week, if they do at all.

Sorry to disappoint you all, but both ABBA singles are currently top of the streaming charts in the UK with 900,000 plus streams in 48 hours and are out selling the nearest rivals by 4/1. Spotify haven’t included their streaming figures but have stated that most streaming of the tracks is between 18-24 year olds. The album alone has had pre orders of 40,000 in its first day which alone would give both singles the top spot in the download chart and both are clearly on track to take the top two spots in Fridays chats.

I believe they will get #1 come Saturday. Not only in the UK but the Irish charts and the Australian charts. Abba have always been highly promoted and continue to do so as we speak. Already the Australia TV are promoting them. Abba gold started to really take off when Muriel's Wedding was released and used Abba songs ( the village people were first choice but that fell through, kylie was looked at but cos she just starting out there was not enough of her songs, I think..) Instead of them looking to supporting Australian acts, it chooses to look for overseas acts. So another wave they succeed from. They will also top the Album charts. They have a fan base and it may be big enough for them to get that #1 song. Like I commented before I am not a fan of theirs, and their kind of music, in my opinion only, is no different to the other seventies band. It's not bad but not great either. Nothing special, and their music did not change the world and no outstanding studio albums/songs to really talk about. Credit also to Stig Anderson who co-wrote many of Abba's biggest hits such as Dancing Queen, Knowing Me Knowing you, I do, I do, I do, I do, I do, Name Of the Game, Waterloo, Mama Mia, SOS, Ring Ring, Honey Honey , Fernando not to mention other songs. We all need a little help from our friends huh.

How do they determine the age of the streamers. If this is true some could be probably streaming it for their parents or grandparents who know nothing whatsoever about computers..

Where did you get the info on the 900,000 streams from?

hi Sarah...i do agree with you..the best group to come out of Sweden is ROXETTE! They have released some amazing tracks over the last 35 years but unfortunately became so underrated in the 00's!! Shame as they are so talented!!

Truer words have not been spoken. Roxette deserved better recognition. Maybe someday, we can only hope. I loved them, still do. Great group, great music.

I'm enough of a fan that I did 2 degree dissertations on them: one for their music and production (specifically the Voulez-Vous album), the other on their cultural impact discussing reasons for their success in relation to other acts. Probably the greatest single artist of all time, and there are some seriously sophisticated composition and production techniques in there, especially for the time. Other acts I would rate as highly are Meat Loaf/Jim Steinman songs and Queen. All 3 do or have held an all-time UK Album Chart record, but that's a discussion for another time.

Indeed, credit to (The) Stig :-). You say they need help from friends. Yes. Unusually, unless you count the translation services of Phil Cody and Neil Sedaka on their first Eurovision entry (RIng Ring), he is the only one they co-composed with in over a 140 song catalogue. Michael Tretow being their only engineer for their entire first career. Lasse Halstrom their only video director and they were self-produced. Like all acts, they had their collaborations, but surprisingly few for such a long career (10 years). Much fewer than most who last as long.

Australia should be no surprise. It's arguably Australia in 1975 that is the reason we still talk about them today. If not for that, they could well have been yet another forgotten Eurovision winning footnote in chart history, noted only for winning Eurovision.

I'd like you to be right about the singles. The album is pretty much assured to keep their strange chart stat running of never having had a top 10 album that failed to be #1. Their highest peak position for any album below #1 is #13! (Their self-titled and More Gold).

It's within the realms of possibility that the original Gold could beat it's own record again: In 1999 it became the album with the longest gap between weeks at #1 (7 years). In 2008 it broke it's own record by extending that gap to 9 years. This gap so far is 13 years. One of the most fascinating chart runs ever.

Could be interesting as it will be up against the new Ed Sheeran from October. Jusdging from the previous 3 albums, it will still be #1 when the Abba album is release and will be head to head.

Over the years Abba has had 2 movies out so naturally one would expect Abba gold to hit number 1,yet again, but doubt could do it otherwise. This time it's because they are releasing new songs and well, you say ouch, and people go and buy your songs. Never will understand that.

I assume it’s taken from peoples account details from when they joined whichever streaming platform they use.

I have my sources 🤫 But you should bare in mind that 900,000 only equates to 90,000 physical sales as the formula in the UK is 100 streams equates to one sale. Also, global streaming currently puts I Still Have Faith In You in poll position and Don’t Shut Me Down at number 3.

Thanks

Thanks for the info :)

Just let all those ugly opinions hang out, Sarah.
Haven't seen that apology yet, btw.

ABBA have already said that there are no Instrumentals on the 'Voyage' Album. 'Ode To Freedom' is an Anthem type Song. ABBA Recorded it several times - to get it sounding just right.

Thanks. I don't believe they'd actually stated that a month ago when I first posted.