The second airing came as I sat like an angry lemon in a traffic jam on the M25 heading to my parents' house. I'd been stranded in slow and no moving traffic for 45 minutes. Travel news on Radio 2 informed me that things weren't going to get better any time soon, so I settled down to listen to their early evening request show with a chirpy Irish fella who sounds a little like your man who does the gardening with the curly angel hair.
A bloke phoned in to say his granddaughter was coming to stay for the weekend. He was excited about taking her on a cycle ride and to the beach. There was something genuine and honest about his voice, and by the time he stopped talking, I was as excited as he was about his granddaughter's visit! The song request was hers: Mamma Mia.
I don't know why I should find it so moving that the songs I've loved all my life should still be entertaining children today, but I was. That's the timeless nature of ABBA...
I turned the radio up and decided to sing at the top of my lungs to take the pain of the traffic jam away... But then a funny thing happened. The traffic began to move, and within seconds I was traveling at 80 mph and turning onto a relatively empty M11. Ah! The power of ABBA!
I had a lovely time with the parents and came home to watch an episode of Glee... One of our guilty pleasures, and coincidentally, the episode was about guilty pleasures. And how did it end? A massive ensemble version of Mamma Mia featuring the entire cast dressed in silver jump suits!
I find it very hard to express how I feel when I hear ABBA. Desperate sadness, deep joy, utter nostalgia... A sense that perfection is possible. If I didn't hear at least one ABBA song in a day, I'm sure my life would rapidly cease to make sense.
Go on... Go do it. Go to You Tube and type in "Summer Night City" or "When All Is Said and Done" or "As Good As New" and let the magic begin!
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