Saturday, June 22, 2019

Agnetha - Fanmade Cover Artwork - Dom Har Glömt & Shame

BY WICKUS - One of my ABBA-friends suggested that I make covers of these songs and I chose the B-sides. I am pretty happy with how they turned out! I seem to be developing a more modern take on making some covers, as with the Shame one. Not very 80s, more 2010's haha! Still, I love that picture for Shame! It fits perfectly. The picture used for Dom Har Glömt was taken at a live performance in 1975, where Agnetha performed the song live, alongside Tack För En Underbar, Vanlig Dag, which I aptly made the B-side of that one.


ABBA - Fanmarde Cover Artwork - Box Set Ideas

BY RUBBERBALLALEX -In the past few years, ABBA has released singles box sets for each album. Arrival, The Album, and Voulez-Vous have been released so far. Surely the other albums will be released in the future. Therefore, I predicted the singles and coloured vinyl for each album. Here are the Ring Ring singles. All these singles were released in Scandinavia except for Nina, Pretty Ballerina. Both Nina, Pretty Ballerina (Austrian release) and Love Isn’t Easy both had I Am Just A Girl as a B-Side so I put Disillusion instead on Nina, Pretty Ballerina.


Moving onto the Waterloo singles, I used the English and French versions of Waterloo (I realised just now that I forgot the Swedish version), Honey Honey and Hasta Manana. My favourite picture cover was the Italian one but Watch Out would’ve already used as a B-Side on Waterloo I utilised the 1974 remix of Ring Ring instead for Hasta Manana. All four original singles would be included in the ABBA (1975) singles box set in my opinion.

The Super Trouper singles box set is most likely to be released next year. Two singles were mainly released around the world: The Winner Takes It All and Super Trouper. Lay All Your Love On Me and Happy New Year was released as well but in selected countries. 


For The Visitors singles Boxset, I redid Under Attack and No Hay A Quien Culpar. The latter was released in one South American country with no cover but was pressed on red vinyl. I could’ve done Se Me Esta Escapando but we would all have been skint by then!!!

Finally, I had selected only a few singles from the Gracias Por La Musica era. I did the coppers for Estoy Sonando, Gracias Por La Musica, and Hasta Manana. Hasta Manana was beset from the RCA company sleeve used in South America. My friend Wickus created the awesome cover of Andante Andante which I thought would be great if it was included.






Friday, June 21, 2019

ABBA - Fanmade Cover Artwork (South African Sheet Music Style)

BY RUBBERBALLALEX - My friend Alex did such a marvelous job! I sent him pictures I received from a fellow ABBA fan here in South Africa who owns a collection of rare South African sheet music. With the shortage of picture sleeves for South African ABBA singles on the Sunshine label, Alex took influence from the sheet music and created cover artwork based upon each one. I can totally envision the singles with these covers! I own a copy or two of each of these singles, and I would've ABBAsolutely loved seeing these covers on them! Alex, I am so amazed by these!! Well done, really well done! Here you can see Alex's covers next to the original sheet music.





Sunday, June 9, 2019

ABBA - One Of Us - Fanmade Cover Artwork (UK)

BY WICKUS - I've made 3 versions of how I would've liked to see One Of Us released in the UK. The original was absolutely terrible and then Epic proceeded to make a picture disc of it! Nonetheless, it's still easily recognisable. 
The first one isn't great at all... I think it's different and I like the picture and the blue background goes well with the grey and white.
The second one may look a bit too modern for '81. I spent most of the 38 minutes cutting them out and made the background transparent so that I could overlay them over the ABBA logo. I still like it, though.
The third one is my favourite. It has the same feel like the cover most releases had and the text has the exact same colour swatch as the text on the original/ugly Epic cover. 







Frida - Shine Era - Fanmade Cover Artwork

BY RUBBERBALLALEX For Frida's 2nd English album, several singles were released. Shine was released worldwide, Come To Me was released in Sweden, Holland, Germany and South Africa and Twist In The Dark was only released in France. Heart Of The Country was released in the UK but was a flop there. Heart Of The Country is ridiculously hard to find there. Comfort Me was never released as a single but only as an album track and I utilised the unreleased tracks: I Don't Wanna Be Alone and Can't Be Serious as B-sides to Come To Me and Comfort Me. But there was three more unreleased track which I thought would be perfect for an EP for Heart Of The Country. The Shine singles have originally had a picture in a white background. I experimented using whole pictures which I'm satisfied with. The font used was Avenir Next Condensed.









Friday, June 7, 2019

ABBA - Hasta Mañana - Fanmade Cover Artwork

BY RUBBERBALLALEX - An incredible take on a cover for the South African release for Hasta Mañana/Watch Out on Sunshine records. I sent Alex an image of rare South African sheet music of Hasta Mañana I own and as creative as he is, he started working and made this amazing cover! The font is spot on as well! Oh, how I wish the original single had a picture sleeve and this one would be ABBAsolutely perfect! 


THE ORIGINAL SHEET MUSIC:


Agnetha - Click Track - Fanmade Cover Artwork

BY WICKUS - So in South Africa, Agnetha's 1985 song from the album "Eyes Of A Woman", "Click Track" was released as a single in South Africa on the Sunshine label with "We Move As One" as the B-side. Impossible to find, I can't even find one and I've lived here my whole life! It didn't have a picture sleeve, so I decided to make my own and I quite like it! She looks so bedazzled here!

Tuesday, June 4, 2019

ABBA - I Am The City - Fanmade Cover Artwork

BY HOMETIME - Isn't this just amazing? Again, I love the modern twist hometime used on this one! I would love seeing this as a picture disc or single release in the future! Another great idea for a RSD exclusive! Well done, hometime!

ABBA - Lay All Your Love On Me - Fanmade Cover Artwork

BY LIEBEZEIT - A delightful take on this one! Liebezeit did a terrific job using a more modern and minimalistic layout, yet keeping elegance with the font. I love the way ABBA stands out in the crowd! "'Cause somewhere in the crowd there's you!" Stunning! I'd die if this cover was used on a reissue of this single as a 12"! Maybe a RSD exclusive next year? ;)

Monday, June 3, 2019

ABBA - Money, Money, Money - Fanmade Cover Artwork

BY RUBBERBALLALEX Money Money Money was a global hit. The first cover is based from the original Scandinavian cover but with a different background colour. The official ABBA font: News Gothic was used. I utilised the same photo session for the Dancing Queen cover for the second cover, giving a more classic feel. A photo session was used for the third cover which had ABBA in their kimonos which were featured in the video. I based my third cover from the Australian cover. The back cover of the Australian cover stated "Crazy World" which is what I did for the last cover. The font used for the Australian cover is called "Pretoria".





ABBA - Dancing Queen - Fanmade Cover Artwork

BY RUBBERBALLALEX - Dancing Queen was the no. 1 hit worldwide. The same photo was used for every cover so I utilised the Swedish font, the official ABBA font: News Gothic and the Australian font. Meanwhile, in Germany, the cover looked rather tacky and had too much going on at the same time. The German cover did not age well. I tried to minimalise the cover by using a similar colour scheme and used the same font (Blippo). I wanted to use a different photo than the rest and I feel that this photo works quite well.




Sunday, June 2, 2019

Agnetha - Jag Var Så Kär - Fanmade Cover Artwork

BY WICKUS - My take on the cover of Agnetha's first single back in November of 1967. The picture was used on another one of her early singles, but I loved it and just had to use it here as well! It isn't the best quality picture, but I smoothed it out a bit.

Saturday, June 1, 2019

ABBA - Under Attack - Fanmade Cover Artwork

BY RUBBERBALLALEX - Amazing take on this single! I've always thought the picture was a bit mysterious, which isn't bad, just not exactly "ABBA"... He did an amazing job at making it look cleaner and fitting with the "The Singles - The First Ten Years" era (1982) with the original font  and colours of the text. Beautiful!

ABBA - My Mama Said - Fanmade Cover Art (Danish)

BY WICKUS - First official cover art post! I've always loved the 1974-5 Danish layout of ABBA singles. "My Mama Said" is, in my opinion, one of the most underrated ABBA songs. This is my interpretation if it were released as a single in Denmark. Even the well-respected Swedish author and historian that knows pretty much everything about ABBA, Carl Magnus Palm, approves of this edit I did!

Welcome!

Welcome to my blog! I've loved creating my own interpretations of ABBA/Agnetha/Frida 7" single covers for a while now, but I didn't really have somewhere to share it publically. My great friend @rubberballalex sent me a link to a similar blog, but for Kylie Minogue and he felt that there should be an ABBA one as well. That's when it clicked, I have to make one dedicated to ABBA!

So here it is, in all its glory! I may be 16-years of age, but I am (and have always been) a HUGE ABBA fan. I have been messing around with various photo editing software and I'd like to believe that I've most certainly improved over the years. I want to use this blog as a platform, to personally share my creations with fellow ABBA fans. My dream would be to have many ABBA fans' creations on this blog and form a friendly community!

If you come across this blog, have any form of ABBA-related art, PLEASE do not hesitate to share it with me via the email address on the side of the blog or DM me on Instagram @that_abba_dude. You do not have to be a professional at all to submit your creations. I'm nothing near a professional. I just make these covers to experiment and visually portray the only little bit of creativity I have. I hated Art class in school, but if it's ABBA-related, I'm in!

ABBA hugs

Wickus