After half a century of indelible hits and a quarter-century of sold-out theatrical engagements, ABBA enter the holographic realm in London’s ABBA Voyage, now in its third year.

Watch: ABBA Voyage teaser trailer

How can you not love ABBA? There’s a reason why they sold more records than anybody, that music, the songs, my kids love ABBA!

– Dave Grohl to Anderson Cooper, CNN, 2012

I find myself in a London pub for the first time, a Germany vs. Spain football match on screen, as crimson wigs and silver chrome jumpsuits flit into view.

A DJ strikes up singalongs, boozy renditions of 70s classics – “Islands in the Stream,” “December ‘63,” “We Are Family.” Painstaking costume recreations, disco flare collars and chromium platform boots, indicate we are all here for the same reason: ABBA is reuniting tonight.

A bit of an asterisk; ABBA reunites several times per week at a specially constructed stadium in Southwest London. None of the members are physically present.

This is ABBA Voyage.

In 2022, George Lucas’s ILM Studios partnered with Agnetha Faltskogg, Benny Andersson, Bjorn Ulvaes and Anni-Frid Lyngstadd to create ‘the ABBA-tars.” Employing the CGI motion capture technology that has brought Gollum and Peter Jackson’s Avatar films, the ex-ABBA members spent weeks in skintight suits covered with ping-pong balls. They mimed a selection of their greatest hits, deep cuts, and several new tracks for the eponymous reunion album ABBA Voyage. This was the latest in a series of efforts that inspired an alternate title for this write-up: “Help, I Drank Too Much Wine and now the Corporeal Forms of ABBA are Resurrected as 3D Avatars Ensconced in Time.”

ABBA, one of the most successful acts of the 1970s, consisted of two real-life couples who eventually divorced and, when they lost the steam to soldier on, ceased live performance entirely in 1983.

Yet with the advent of the multibillion-dollar Mamma Mia global film and musical enterprise, the nostalgic regalia of the band in its heyday set off something of a pull back into orbit. Andersson and Ulvaeus helped arrange their compositions for the stage, and all four attended the film premiere for Mamma Mia. Then, the inevitable: In Stockholm, 2016, the band commemorated the 50th anniversary of its songwriting genesis with an unannounced reunion performance of “Me and I.” To date, it is the final physical performance of ABBA. This detente seems to have paved the way for a reunion album and the tie-in London concert experience.

We’re guided into a large dome with neon pathways, as a Swedish voice- Benny or Bjorn’s- heralds 15 minutes until the show. Dozens of strings of light hang from the ceiling and perforated circular fixtures hang over the crowd. Onstage, a forest is projected onto three large screens. A large trapezoidal dance pit for standing room guests is flush with the stage.

I’m seated center right in the back row. In addition to costumes and wigs pulled straight from the ABBA repertoire, several audience members are clad in Tron-esque jumpsuits with fluorescent orange piping. This is a multi-generational affair – young families, twenty- and thirty-somethings (the Mamma Mia film crowd), and those who may have seen ABBA in their heyday. Two shows are packed daily. A droning Gregorian chant fades out before we are asked not to film anything, “to maintain the mystery of ABBA voyage.” In this spirit, the veil will only be partially lifted on the evening’s proceedings; Originally slated to run from 2022 through summer 2024, the ABBA Voyage arena-specially built- has been extended through 2026.

The setlist for ABBA voyage is rigid- the band members spent several weeks in 2021 recording specific motion capture- and, to my ears, some of the vocal production sounded more modern, likely captured from those sessions. Each hologram has a “solo spot” with pre-recorded dialogue introducing one song and expressing gratitude for our attendance. There are several presentational workarounds – for “Eagle” and “Voulez-Vous,” we follow the animated adventures of a young warrior heroine in a style reminiscent of the recent Spider-Verse and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles films. The live band that plays the accompanying tracks, a pristine studio unit, gets a vocal showcase on “Does Your Mother Know,” in a gender-swap that wisely employs the revised perspective of the tune from Mamma Mia. Otherwise, the ABBAtars – and the CGI models of ILM – take center stage.

So, the burning question: How well does the effect work?

From a purely visual standpoint, the illusion of ABBA Voyage works best when the slightly oversized band appears in a lineup of four (in the “BAAB” or “post-divorce” order, as Twitter has pointed out) in partial shadow. First and foremost, the models themselves are spot-on-likenesses scanned directly from the modern members and artificially de-aged. The laser light fixtures and unrelenting dance party vibe scarcely allow the audience to dwell on any idiosyncrasies. Each costume is meticulously recreated and shimmers, sparkles and flows accordingly in medium-length shots of the band in motion.

The limitations of this technology, however, are mostly laid bare when the giant de-aged faces of the ABBA models are projected on the screens that flank the main stage, without dramatic lighting. The lip-synchronization occasionally teeters off the tightrope of the uncanny valley (see: motion capture films like The Polar Express). Only one number fully stretches the limits of the technology beyond reasonable doubt – “Lay All Your Love on Me” features contortions that wouldn’t be out of place in an anime and the effect is a bit dizzying.

Now, the follow-up question: Does any of this make ABBA Voyage any less affecting?

There is a push-pull the moment the lights dim. ABBA are four living, working individuals who are choosing not to tour and instead present a facsimile of their heyday. Each member gamely recorded their parts for this and the tie-in reunion album, and provide insight and quips in the form of their hologram selves during the evening’s proceedings. At about the three-song mark, the entire experience becomes so immersive and nostalgic that most qualms fade away. Everyone is on their feet, singing along to every word, growing teary-eyed as they reminisce on where they first heard these tunes. The ABBA catalog is indelible.

I find myself fighting back tears on several occasions. These are not the real singers of the songs I learned when I was six years old, singing along with my sister in the back of the family Toyota Avalon. And yet my father, two seats to my right, is singing along just the same, as is my mom. The woman to my left, who has otherwise sat in silent appreciation for the entire evening, hears the opening piano to “Thank You For the Music.” Without moving, she sings every word in a beautiful voice. And the tears begin to flow.

“So I say thank you for the music,
the songs I’m singing
Thanks for all the joy they’re bringing
Who can live without it? I ask in all honesty
What would life be?
Without a song or a dance, what are we?
So I say thank you for the music,
for giving it to me”

There are several musical and visual surprises in store for the evening, but I won’t spoil them here. After all, I must do my part to “maintain the mystery of ABBA Voyage.” I owe them that much at least.

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