‘The Winner Takes It All’ is ABBA’s Biggest Hit

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By Douglas A. McIntyre Published
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‘The Winner Takes It All’ is ABBA’s Biggest Hit

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Could this be the year ABBA finally wins a grammy? The wildly popular Swedish pop band of the 1970s and early ‘80s decided in 2021 to make a comeback – – after separating in 1982 – and release a new album. The four-member group had previously released an album in 1981. Their most recent album, “Voyage,” turned out to be another hit. (Here are the biggest hits of the ’70s according to Billboard.)

Of course, ABBA has had many hits in the 50-something years since the band started in 1972. But their biggest hit remains “The Winner Takes It All.” Released in 1980, it was on the Billboard Hot 100 for 26 weeks, peaking at No. 8 for two weeks.

Perhaps somewhat surprising, ABBA has never won a Grammy. But with the success of “Voyage,” the band has four Grammy nominations. They’re nominated for Album of the Year and Best Pop Vocal Album for “Voyage,” as well as Record of the Year and Best Pop Duo/Group Performance for their single “Don’t Shut Me Down.” (Here are the most popular artists that never had a No. 1 hit.)

Despite its years in retirement, ABBA continued to make money. The quartet of Björn Ulvaeus, Agnetha Fältskog, Anni-Frid Lyngstad (aka Frida), and Benny Andersson has sold about 150 million studio albums over some 50 years. It is the most successful pop act to come out of Sweden. Such is ABBA’s importance to Swedish culture, in fact, that the group has its own museum in Stockholm.

See 24/7 Tempo’s list of all of ABBA’s biggest hit songs.

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About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.

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