ABBA Super Trouper Deluxe Edition

[Harry]

In today's mailbox was the ABBA Super Trouper Deluxe Edition from the UK.

These Deluxe Editions of ABBA's albums have been coming out about one per year over the last four or five years. They all contain a CD and a DVD. The CD is usually an expanded edition that collects singles from the era with alternate language tracks and b-sides. The DVDs have contained era-appropriate television appearances and promo videos including TV commercials. This one for Super Trouper follows the same pattern.

Starting with the last one released, Voulez-Vous, greater attention has been paid to the actual CD mastering, making these finally sound better than previous issues where the loudness wars took their toll. I can report that the mastering on the new Super Trouper sounds great. It compares favorably to the highly-regarded old '80s pressing of the album done by Atlantic. I'm fortunate enough to have that issue and this new one really does sound just about as good, with an edge to the new one for modern and perhaps better analog-digital conversion techniques.

I've not yet looked at the DVD, but I'm sure it will be intriguing for fans.

Now - US fans - you'll have to import this from some other country as Universal in the States hasn't bothered with these Deluxe Editions. I've ordered mine from Amazon UK and it arrived today. It's listed at Amazon Canada, but release date isn't until May 31.

ABBA fans will want this one.

Harry

 

[Rick-An Ordinary Fool]

Harry, I was looking at this release about a week ago and thought about ordering it. I would be interested if you could report back once you have viewed the DVD. It looks like the video tracks have never been released before, kinda hard to believe since there has been so many DVD releases thus far from their catalog. I have the blue velvet box Abba The Complete Studio Recordings which also includes a DVD w/ bonus tracks.

The one thing I'm not crazy about on that box set is the loudness of the albums, I have them loaded up in my iPod and whenever I have it on random mode and it comes across one of the tracks from a CD from this box, it is so much louder than any other CD I uploaded to my iPod. I mean some of them are really loud, still I'm very glad to have that box set.

 

[Harry]

Chris,

The DVD included in the Deluxe Edition of SUPER TROUPER does indeed have unique, never-before-released video. It starts with three songs performed on German TV (SHOW EXPRESS), "The Winner Takes It All", "Super Trouper" and "On and On and On". I believe these are all lip-synced to the records:



Next up is "Happy New Year", another German TV appearance (SVT):



Then comes a little documentary called "Words And Music". It's in English and we get to hear from all four members of the group, interspersed with scenes from their music videos:



Another film made around the photo shoot for the cover, newly compiled for this DVD release, called "Somewhere In The Crowd There's You."



Following that are 2 remastered promo videos, 2 TV commercials for SUPER TROUPER, and an international sleeve gallery for the singles.

The disc is in NTSC format and region 0, so it'll play in our DVD players just fine. The images above were taken straight from the DVD, so you can get an idea of the quality of some of the features.

As far as I know, other than the promo videos, none of this stuff has been released before, but some of it has probably made the home-trading circuit in grainy, wobbly form.

The CD sounds great and compares favorably to the best-ever release of SUPER TROUPER, the old Atlantic disc from the '80s. This one's just a little louder than that, but nowhere near the ear-bleeding levels used on that Complete Studio Recordings Box Set. I loved that set for its contents, but the mastering is way too loud. This Deluxe Edition is the one to get if you can't find the tough-to-find original Atlantic CD.

The packaging is arranged just like the previous Deluxe Editions with one inconsistency - there's no plastic slipcase, so the titles are printed right on the back of the digi-pak. That's either a plus or a minus, depending on whether you like the plastic slipcases. With this arrangement, you won't lose the rice-paper insert for the track list, but then I thought that was pretty classy.

Harry

 

[Rick-An Ordinary Fool]

Thanks Harry for the update and scans. So is Super Trouper and Voulez-Vous the 2 Deluxe Edition's with the CD/DVD you were referring to? Did you also opt for Voulez-Vous? Now I'm thinking of getting both these, primarly for the DVD footage.

Super Trouper has always been one of my favorite albums. I have The Abba Remasters Super Trouper CD I bought quite a long time ago it was put out by Polar/Polydor in 1980 I believe. Atlantic is not indicated anywhere on this one.

It's funny because the Carpenters also performed on the German tv Show Express I believe in 1981 and sang Beechwood 45789 and Top of the World in which Karen is dressed in what looks alot like that same blue outfit she wore on MMM tv special here in the US.

 

[Harry]

There are actually now four official Deluxe Editions with CD and DVDs. They started with ARRIVAL, which featured a one-hour television special called ABBA-DABBA-DOO.

ABBA, THE ALBUM had a deluxe edition that featured a bunch of TV appearances. Then came VOULEZ-VOUS with its ABBA IN SWITZERLAND TV special, and that brings us up to the current SUPER TROUPER.

Actually, the trend got started in a smaller way with the WATERLOO album in its 30th Anniversary issue. It was a CD/DVD set that included bonus tracks on the CD and had a DVD with four video appearances from TV - two versions of "Waterloo", a performance of "Honey, Honey" and my favorite, a black & white TV video of "Hasta Mañana". I think it was the success of that set that got Polar to do the other Deluxe Editions.

One caveat on the WATERLOO DVD is that it uses the PAL system for its video. Some US players and TV's can handle it, most can't, but it's playable on most computers with DVD drives. Thankfully all of the other Deluxe Editions use NTSC video for the DVDs, making them quite playable here. But none of these special packages were ever released in the US. You have to get them from overseas or maybe Canada.

As for the Atlantic SUPER TROUPER, I'd read all about its virtues somewhere on the web and found it in a used bin for $7. It's just an early mastering to CD, but because they didn't muck it up with any modern processing, it sounds great - and very much the opposite of the loud-volume issues that followed. It's the only one of ABBA's albums that got a CD release in the US in the old days, since "The Winner Takes It All" was such a big hit here.

Harry