Abba: Benny Andersson explains how Voyage residency will work

‘We got sort of turned on by the thought that we could actually be on stage without us being there,’ said Benny Andersson

Benny Anderson has explained how the avatar technology will work for Abba’s forthcoming Voyage residency.

The Swedish pop hitmakers reunited last year for their first album in four decades, Voyage, which is set to be followed by a groundbreaking residency in London.

Having refused all sorts of financial offers to reform for years, Abba eventually decided to get back together after British entrepreneur Simon Fuller pitched a futuristic idea that the Swedish superstars couldn’t refuse: the Abba Voyage residency.

“We got sort of turned on by the thought that we could actually be on stage without us being there,” said ABBA singer-songwriter Benny Andersson.

Agnetha Fältskog, Anni-Frid Lyngstad, Bjorn Ulvaeus and Andersson will be returning to London on 27 May – as Abba-tars – to kick off the 196-show concert residency, taking place at the newly built Abba Arena in London’s Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park.

Fuller, along with producer Ludvig Andersson (Andersson’s son) and Svana Gisla (music video producer for the likes of Beyoncé and Radiohead) has partnered with Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) to ensure that the music and the tech combine to provide a realistic performance.

ILM is the special effects company founded by Star Wars creator George Lucas which has worked on projects including Star Wars, Marvel films and Jurassic Park .

There are 1,000 visual effect artists working on Abba voyage, making it the biggest project ILM has done to date, according to Rolling Stone.

How does it all work?

Across seven concerts per week, the Abba-tars will perform for 90 minutes per show.

Digital avatars will embody the stars in their 1970s heyday, performing a 22-song set of their greatest hits, backed by a real-life human band, assembled by the Klaxons’ James Righton.

Towards the end of the pandemic, the Swedish group met from 10am to 5pm each day for four weeks in a row, to perform before 200 cameras and a crew of 40, while wearing motion-capture suits.  “It was really a pleasure for all of us,” the elder Andersson told Rolling Stone.

The songwriter said that each star was paired with a younger body double. “We are sort of merged together with our body doubles. Don’t ask me how it works because I can’t explain that,” he said.

“If you’re 75, you don’t jump around like you did when you were 34, so this is why this happened.”

It was a no-brainer for the group to launch the Abba Voyage in the UK. “The English people have always treated Abba like we were their own, for some weird reason,” Andersson added. “They’ve taken Abba to their hearts and they show us that.”

Abba Voyage runs from 27 May to 31 December 2022 at Abba Arena in Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park. You can find tickets here.