ABBA Receive First Swedish Knighthoods In 50 Years

How can one describe ABBA's greatness and the impact they continue to leave on music to this day? You look to their native Sweden and witness them receiving a prestigious knighthood that hasn’t been bestowed on anyone in 50 years.

Fifty years after winning Eurovision with their song Waterloo, ABBA received the Order of the Vasa in the capital of Sweden, Stockholm.

In an all-too-rare public appearance from the pop band, King Carl XVI Gustaf presented all four members—Agnetha Fältskog, Benny Andersson, Björn Ulvaeus, and Anni-Frid Lyngstad—with knighthoods in a ceremony that aired live in Sweden.

The pop music icons were named “Commander of the First Class” and received the Order of the Vasa for “very outstanding efforts in Swedish and international music life”.

While ABBA released a comeback album, Voyage, in 2021, the group haven’t toured together or played any one-off performances in four decades. In 2022, ABBA Arena (a state-of-the-art, 3000-capacity arena at the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in London) opened for the ABBA Voyage hologram concerts.

Since its inception, ABBA Voyage has sold over one million tickets. Last year, sources at Variety hinted that the hologram concert could go on a world tour.

Discussing the emergence of the ABBA hologram tour in 2018, Molly Meldrum, who has campaigned for the iconic group to bring the show to Australia, said, “ABBA are going to tour again, but it’s with a difference, with a magical difference. So, I'll use the old saying - do yourself a favour and check it out!”

In a statement, Ulvaeus said of ABBA’s 2021 song Just A Notion – released 43 years after it was originally penned: “Benny has recorded a new backing track to which we’ve added drums and guitars, but all vocals are from the original 1978 tracks.

“In a way, it demonstrates what we plan to do with ABBA Voyage in 2022. There, we will have a live band playing, but all vocals will be from the old recordings.”