Cher’s Glorious Cyborgification of ABBA
When one legend of pop camp covers another, the results are preposterous—and weirdly moving.
by Spencer Kornhaber
Aug 25, 2018
3 minutes
As is the case for all great acts that rewrite the definition of “pop music,” ABBA hacked the machinery of human emotion. They took the eternal tick-tock of disco and latched it to the glorious confinement of the 3-minute verse-chorus workout. They found a universal mean between four individualized singers. And they deduced the equation that specifies a certain amount of emotional down needs to enable the ecstatic up: Before smiling and having fun, you have to remember how sick and tired you felt last night in.
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