SWEDEN
Waterloo 1974
Fifty years ago, on 6 April, ABBA won the Eurovision Song Contest and went on to become global superstars. To mark the anniversary of this win, Sweden released a three-stamp miniature sheet, Waterloo 1974, on the day of the anniversary.
Under their original name of Festfolk, Benny Andersson, Björn Ulvaeus, Agnetha Fältskog and Anni-Frid ‘Frida’ Lyngstad entered Melodifestivalen, the competition to select Sweden’s entry for the Eurovision Song Contest in 1974, with the song ‘Waterloo’, which took them all the way to the Eurovision finals in Brighton. By the time of the competition, they had changed their name to ABBA, an acronym of their first names. The Eurovision Song Contest on 6 April 1974 saw the group win the international juries over with ‘Waterloo’, although ‘nil’ points were awarded by various juries, including the one from the UK.
Soon after the win, ‘Waterloo’ was no. 1 in the music charts all over Europe, even reaching the top ten in the US, where Eurovision had no impact. The album of the same name was also a huge hit in Sweden. However, being the winners of Eurovision initially made it difficult for ABBA to be taken seriously internationally when they tried to follow this first success. Their next major worldwide hit, 18 months later, was ‘SOS’, taken off their third album, simply entitled ABBA.
By 1976, ABBA were established as one of the most popular groups
