Australian ABBA tribute ABBAsolutely fABBAulous returned to Windsor’s Chrysler Theatre this past Tuesday (June 4) to kick off their Canadian tour and brought fans a pretty close replication of an ABBA show from the 70’s. About the only thing missing in Windsor’s show was a giant disco ball, but the set and costumes more than made up for it.
This show is the whole package, with not just great sounding music that if you closed your eyes you would be hard pressed to tell the difference, but also accurate costuming and stage props, and even the Swedish accents. This production works hard at it to the point of studying old footage of ABBA shows on their days off to perfect the stage moves and the voices. The accents and stage banter sounded a little corny to me at times and I’m not sure if that was intentional, but the fans didn’t seem to mind.
During the first half of the show they began playing Dancing Queen then abruptly stopped, asking the crowd the name of the song and saying, “It’s not called Sitting Queen, get up here and dance”. There were several costume changes by the ladies during the show and the Bjorn Ulvaeus character used a copy of the star guitar that Ulvaeus was famous for.
The show is designed to get the audience involved and during the second half they asked the crowd if there was a Man After Midnight in the crowd. After walking up one of the aisles they coaxed a gentleman from his seat and brought him on stage, put a pink hat and boa on him and had a little fun dancing with him and having him do a limbo under a mic stand.
The four main performers are backed by a very tight sounding four piece backup band featuring a bassist, drummer, Sax player/keyboardist and backing vocalist/guitarist.
The set covered all the big hits you would expect and a few only diehard fans would know. Considering the average age of the audience looked to be 50’s to 60’s I imagine most of them were those diehards. One group of four women, who obviously have seen this show before, came dressed in matching capes and furry boots, prepared to dance the night away.
I would highly recommend seeing this show if they make a return to the 519 area. Whether you’re a big ABBA fan or just love good music and a fun night out, ABBAsolutely fABBAulous delivers on all counts.
All photos by Dan Boshart
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