The Voice Returns Following “Necessary” Silence
With news of Agnetha Fältskog’s first album of new recordings since 1987’s “I Stand Alone” album hitting the news circuits with reports surfacing in countries all over the world, you would almost think this album is the biggest thing since the invention of the wheel. This album comes following a period where Agnetha has declared that “the silence was necessary” and at this point it is unknown if this album becomes a one-off album or the start of a new phase in her recording career. Although Staffan Lindé, who serves as her media contact, speculates that more albums could follow, Agnetha is known for not enjoying the promotional activities surrounding generating awareness for an album and the relentlessness of the media could make her decide some more silence is necessary or permanently necessary.
Following ABBA and moderately successful solo careers, both Agnetha and Anni-Frid “Frida” Lyngstad, had long periods between the “end” of their careers and their release of another album. In Frida’s case, even though she did make appearances and do several one-off song projects, twelve years had elapsed between her “last” solo album, 1984’s “Shine,” and when she returned to give it another go in 1996 with, “Djupa Andetag.” Whether Frida had any expectations at the time of recording her 1996 album to do another album following it, the choice of singing in Swedish was perhaps a “safe” move. If the plan was to do more than one album, the Swedish album could be perceived as dipping her toe in the water to get reacquainted with the music industry. Singing in Swedish would ensure that the project could remain small and manageable because it would only appeal to people in Sweden and a small percentage of ABBA fans outside of Sweden. If the album was in English, the album’s success could have exploded onto the global market and attract more attention than Frida was prepared to handle at the time. Her choice of recording in Swedish helped ensure the scale of the album was something that would be manageable for what she wanted to deal with at that stage in her life.
In Agnetha’s case, the new album in 2004 will mark seventeen years since her “last” album. However, unlike Frida, Agnetha is going to releasing an album in English and despite the fact the album’s release date is still several months away, the interest in the album has been surfacing in countries all over the globe as evidenced by the news reports from around the world. Agnetha, as the member of ABBA least likely to talk to the media, that may be a little daunting for her, but in a way, she is also making a “safe” choice with this upcoming album. The album is expected to be a fifteen track acoustic set recorded with a full orchestra and consisting mostly of songs that had been inspirational to Agnetha earlier in her life. Some original works have been written for the project, but it’s not yet known how many, if any, will appear on the album along side the songs Agnetha has selected to share her interpretation of songs she was influenced by. So even though the attention for the album will be global, the choice of doing an album of mostly cover versions of songs that were Agnetha’s original influence is the professional equivalent of Agnetha doing karaoke night at the local bar of her favorite songs from her youth. It’s safe because most of the songs will have been around for decades and some of the attention would be drawn to comparisons to how other artists have done those songs.
Hazell Dean, in the liner notes for her cover album of ABBA songs said, “I was told recently during a press interview that every artist should be able to be self indulgent and record a tribute album sometime in their careers.” I think a cover album, as a form of self-indulgence, should only be entertained if the motivation for doing the cover album is because the songs have meaning to the performer or the performer can contribute uniqueness to the song in a way that has never been done before. In cases like the time H & Claire covered the Gemini song, “Another You, Another Me” just so they could put a sticker on their album to indicate the CD contained a song written by Björn and Benny from ABBA as a selling point for the album, the cover version becomes meaningless and commercially indulgent, not artistically indulgent. The song H & Claire covered was less relevant than the fact they covered it, it could have been any song. When an artist covers any song or does a whole album of covers, the album tends to have two immediately interested audiences, fans of the artist performing the covers and the fans of the artists who have previously performed the songs. Any artist attempting a cover album has quite the challenge of trying to please both of these audiences.
The more forgiving side of the audience will be the fans of the artist who is doing the cover album because the songs will be, for the most part, new to that audience. It’s an opportunity for the artist to introduce their fans to songs that audience might not otherwise have tried. A good example here is Robbie Williams’ “Swing When You’re Winning” where the whole album was filled with Sinatra style songs, which was a great departure from his usual rock style of performance. Robbie Williams adapted his performance to suit the songs as a way to pay tribute to artists and in the process introduced his rock audience to crooner style performance.
The least forgiving audience will be side of the audience that are fans of the original or other artists who have previously performed the songs being covered. This part of the audience will, for the most part, be new to the artist doing the cover album and will be more concerned with how the artist performs the songs they are already familiar with. This part of the audience will already have a preconceived notion of how the song should be performed and some will want a faithful rendition of the song as it has been done previously. Others will want the new artist performing it to adapt the song to give it a completely fresh and different interpretation, in other words, have the artist try and make the song their own. Erasure’s EP of ABBA covers, at least to the audience of this column, is a case where many ABBA fans became aware of Erasure and their EP is often considered part of the ABBA revival that began in the early 1990s. Erasure brought a fresh interpretation of four ABBA songs to an audience that may or may not have taken a chance on Erasure’s original songs released prior to their ABBA covers and topped the UK charts for the first time in the process. Some ABBA fans love the Erasure covers and others despise them. As Annie Lennox once sang on her cover album, “It’s a thin line between love and hate” and when doing covers artists walk a razor thin line that they just have to expect some people will love the cover and others will hate it. It’s possible that cover version can attract new audience members or alienate current audience members.
I am personally excited more about the fact that Agnetha’s new album is going to be acoustically performed with an orchestra than the fact it’s a cover album. Most of the songs, if not all of them, will be new for me and even if I was aware of previous or original versions of the song, I fall in the audience category that is allowing Agnetha to introduce me to songs I would not have heard otherwise. I am more interested in the fact that Agnetha is going to try performing in a different manner than she has done before. I love it when artists try something different. I think its especially more important for artists who have been around for a while to try something different instead of constantly trying to reinterpret their first hit on every subsequent album. The artist has to evolve.
A prime example is Dolly Parton, as the country music world was turning more towards younger and fresher artists, Dolly Parton was ultimately dropped by her label, RCA despite her track record as both a songwriter and a performer. The label did not feel the country music audience wanted to hear more from Dolly because she was “old news.” Instead of accepting “retirement” and becoming a traveling minstrel on the “remember when I used to be famous” tours hitting small venues and casinos singing nothing but old songs, Dolly decided to finance her own new album and do something she had never done before, a bluegrass album. While the country music scene was shifting towards younger and more pop style country music, Dolly went in the opposite direction. In what was pretty much a return to her roots and what she jokes, “I had to become rich to sing like I was poor,” not only has Dolly has added a new base of fans to her audience, she has also pleased critics far more than when she was the hottest thing in country music, won awards, and showed RCA she was still a viable artist in the process. She’s even had the gall to cover one of the songs that almost seems to incite riots when anyone dares to attempt to cover it, “Stairway To Heaven” and she’s not done reinventing herself as her next album is expected to have a gospel feel.
Additionally, I think a lot of older pop artists need to try something like performing with an orchestra because it helps elevate the perception of the quality of the material being performed. When Frida was asked at the Las Vegas premiere of Mamma Mia about why she hasn’t followed up “Djupa Andetag” with another album, Frida’s response was something to the effect that she didn’t like the fact some critics slammed her for making a pop album at her age. It’s apparently okay for someone in their twenties or thirties to be a pop artist, but not so for someone in their fifties. Again, an orchestra can help elevate the perception of the music being played. Not that a band consisting of a guitarist, a base player, a drummer, and perhaps a keyboardist doesn’t sound great, it’s just when you have to coordinate ten to a hundred or more musicians all on the same stage to all work together to create the rich sound that the vocalists gets the chance to the sing over, it’s nothing short of magic. The potential for disaster increases with every additional player in the orchestra because one person making a mistake can ruin a fantastic moment that when it all works as it should, a song feels much more like an accomplishment than when a small band backs up a vocalist.
I traveled to Montreal in Canada in October 2002, just to hear Corey Hart perform with the Montreal Symphony Orchestra. While the orchestra was for all intents and purposes playing pop/rock music it looked and felt more grandiose and richer than Corey’s original pop/rock album recordings. And some artists like Elaine Paige couldn’t possibly sound better than when they are performing in front of a full orchestra, but I do think its even more special when the artist who is getting up in front of an orchestra to perform is not the type of artist you expect to see in front of an orchestra. So with great excitement, I await to privilege to hear Agnetha Fältskog in front of an orchestra. Maybe if Agnetha succeeds with an orchestra, someone could convince Frida she needs to be in front of one as well or borrow a page from Dolly Parton’s career management book and go back to her roots and get in front of a jazz band.