If, like me, you were born in the twentieth century, then the songs of your youth embedded themselves in your psyche a number of decades ago.
Turning up the volume and shouting them (albeit musically) in the shower or throwing some moves whilst singing into a hairbrush has its place, but nothing beats hearing your favourites sung just as you love them in live performance.
If your treasured performer is still going, there's a good chance you have to re-mortgage your flat to catch them in concert—a standing ticket for Madonna next week will set you back more than £500—but equally they may no longer be on the touring circuit.
As an affordable substitute, a good tribute act will do much more than an excellent cover version, delivering the whole deal, not just the right words and notes in the correct order, and what we got on Tuesday at the Adelphi was just that.
On examination, it may seem a little odd that the cast speak in lightly Swedish accents, but then it’s a question of how far one takes impersonation and, like Benny‘s bad wig, it is perhaps a sign that they don’t take themselves too seriously. Without doubt, this is the right approach because the audience left seriousness at the door; we were all there to have a fun night out and that is what we were given.
Joyfully, Thank You For The Music is pure and simple an ABBA tribute act and makes no attempt to be a bio-musical, so we were spared the history lesson and treated to two packed sets of hit after hit from “Waterloo” to “I Still Have Faith In You”.
Without exception, the songs and harmonies were all delivered faithfully, and whilst Kellie Vallance (Frida) has a more natural stage presence, Emma Parker’s (Agnetha) is the stronger voice.
Steve Nelson (Benny) and Dave Miles (Bjorn) with bassist Ben Hanson, Harry Garbutt on second keyboard and Jason Gumbley on drums are technically proficient at providing the ABBA sound together with two hard-working backing singers, Amy Reet and Elspeth Foster.
As with the arrangements, detail has been applied to the aesthetic of the band so the choreography looks right and the costumes too are recognisably iconic tax deductible ABBA. I can't speak to the authenticity of the banter between the songs, which is made up of some mildly funny jokes, and a weird reference to dancing with Swedish fingers, which sounds like the sort of sex you could have on a motorbike, but that apart, the foursome successfully get the audience on side.
Phone torches gleamed in the darkness for “Fernando”, Ah Ha-s were contributed to “Voulez-Vous”, and those that could joined in with the ‘Swedish line dancing’ for “Ring-Ring”.
The good natured crowd was a microcosm of society; there were those who did swaying pints-in-hand and who wiggled with white wines and others tripped the light with agility, whilst the less able did arm-ography in their seats.
Looking round, there were perhaps just one or two bemused faces and, no, we didn’t sound like a choir of angels when we sang “I Have A Dream”, but my goodness, we were having a good time, and an encore of “Dancing Queen” ended the evening not just on a high note but on an irresistible wave of collective joy.