Mamma Mia

A song that transcended the boundaries of a disco radio hit, finding a long-standing home on Broadway and inspiring a film adaptation (starring Meryl Streep). In 2017, Billboard magazine ranked “Mamma Mia” seventh on its list of ABBA’s 15 best songs, but personally, I don’t think that ranking does justice to the role this simple song has played in popular culture. Millions of people still hum it, often without realizing that it’s actually a very sad song about betrayal and heartbreak.

– At first, lyrics were something of a necessary evil for us, something we had to sing; it was usually about finding a catchy hook and building something more around it. But by the end of the third album, when my English had improved significantly because we traveled a lot, I started thinking it would be nice to have something to say and that people would actually listen to what we were singing—Björn Ulvaeus