ABBA, Avatars and Fox's "Alter Ego" -- The Future of Live Music?

Not that the band one of Sweden39s biggest imports ever went away Forty years after its final studio album quotThe Visitorsquot its sales have been steady buoyed by its use in the stage musical Mamma Mia and its subsequent films Estimates of its total sales approach 400 million albums sold worldwide and over 16 million global streams ABBA Gold its 1992 greatest hits album recently surpassed its 1000th week on the UK albums chart the only title to achieve that Nary a wedding party has been thrown without their No 1 quotDancing Queenquot on its playlist That song was added to the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2015But a return of the band to recording after an absence of nearly 40 years is something few expected Their new album Voyage will be released Nov 5 on Capitol Records Already the smooth writing and production of Bjamp246rn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson with the unmistakable harmonies of Agnetha Famp228itskog and AnniFrid Lyngstad have propelled their new doublesided single to chart heightsquotTo tell the truthquot the band confessed in a press release quotthe main inspiration to record again comes from our involvement in creating the strangest and most spectacular concert you could ever dream ofquotBecause touring and nightly performances would not be optimum for a band whose ages now range from 71 to 76 they39ve created digital avatars to perform in a custombuilt theater in London Tickets are already on sale for the run to see the digital versions of ABBA doing their songs starting May 27 2022 at the new 3000 capacity theater in Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in London A glimpse of the surprisingly sleek and decidedly younger looking avatars comes in the video for its new single quotI Still Have Faith In Youquot which has more than 20 million views on YouTubequotWe have infused a good deal of our souls into those avatarsquot says band member Bjamp246rn Ulvaeus 76 quotThe Voyage project has injected new life into us in more ways than onequotTheir four avatars which will be performing with a live 10piece band is the result of months of motioncapture and performance techniques from an 850member team from Industrial Light ampamp Magic the company founded by George Lucas embarking on its first foray into musicquotEven if not in the flesh we will be right there thanks to the work of the creative team and ILMquot says Anderson who with his bandmates has been photographed in the futuristic motioncapture outfits that will inform their onstage versionsBut how unusual will it be as the ABBA press release puts it quotto sit back in an audience and watch our digital selves perform our songsquotAlready there have been concert tours featuring holograms of longdead performers from Roy Orbison to Buddy Holly Next month a Whitney Houston hologram concert takes residency in Las Vegas And this Wednesday will see the premiere of Alter Egos a new singing competition on Fox that will feature avatars of the singersProducer Matilda Zoltowski says the idea for Alter Egos is to take quotpeople who wouldn39t necessarily usually be able to take part in a show or a competition like this and give them the chance to do itquot Those who lack selfconfidence or struggle with body issues or physical disabilities can produce sometimes fantastical avatars to present their singing before an audience and live group of judges as if it were an aspirational Masked Singer the show39s leadinquotThis is beyond makeupquot says william a judge on the show who famously had experience appearing as a hologram during CNN39s 2008 election night coverage quotThis is like next levelquotFox president of alternative entertainment and specials Rob Wade said even when the network announced Alter Egos in the spring the technology wasn39t quite there quotWe really could never have done it before this moment in timequot he notedAnd citing the ABBA announcement he said avatars of the show winners can record and quottour live around the world at a stadiumquotClick the social buttons to share this content with your friends and colleaguesThe opinions and points of view expressed in this content are exclusively the views of the author andor subjects and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillagecomMyersBizNet Inc management or associated writers

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ABBA, Avatars and Fox's "Alter Ego" -- The Future of Live Music?

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Roger Catlin

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ABBA, Avatars and Fox's "Alter Ego" -- The Future of Live Music?

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