ABBA’s Agnetha Fältskog drops comeback single, album to come

The Associated Press, Monday, March 11, 2013, 11:27am (PDT)

Agnetha Fältskog –- one of the As in ABBA -- has marked her return to the spotlight with a new single and promises of a fresh album this May.

The Swedish pop legend today dropped the single “When You Really Loved Someone.” It's the first taster of her appropriately titled album, “A,” which Universal Music Group will release on May 13.

News of Agnetha's unlikely return to music circles will surely fuel speculation of a blockbuster reunion with her former bandmates Björn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson and Anni-Frid Lyngstad. Today, however, is all about Agnetha.

Agnetha has been working with Grammy-nominated songwriter/producer Jorgen Elofsson (Britney Spears, Kelly Clarkson, Celine Dion and Westlife) and producer/arranger Peter Nordahl on her new album, which includes one of Agnetha first co-writes in many years. “I hadn't written any music for a long, long time,” she says in a statement. “But I sat at the piano, and suddenly it was there.”

The statement opens with this line from Agnetha: “Never thought that I'd ever sing again. But hearing the first three songs, I just couldn't say no!”

Agnetha's team have thrust her into the world of digital promotion. There's a new official website at www.agnetha.co.uk, Facebook (www.facebook.com/pages/Agnetha-Official), Twitter (@AgnethaOfficial) and VEVO channel.

Notes Elofsson,“She wanted to make music again.” He adds, “We could feel that. She had been thinking about it. Basically, she's a musician, a songwriter/singer who hasn't done that for a while. We saw her open up, become much happier, with music again in her life.”

ABBA enjoyed one of the great pop careers in history, selling more than 100 million albums and giving the world such standards as “Money Money Money,” “Dancing Queen” and “Waterloo,” with which they won the Eurovision Song Contest in 1974. They split in 1982 after 10 years at the top. The group was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2010.

“We wanted to make this as if Agnetha hadn't entered ABBA,” says Elofsson. “We were interested in what she sounded like if she hadn't been in the group. And yet it's important that she comes across as we remember her to be.”