Daily Jam - Take a Chance on Me

If there’s one thing I’ve learned in my over four decades on this rock, it’s that someone who claims not to like ABBA is not to be trusted.

I’m not saying that the legendary Swedish pop hit makers necessarily have to be your thing, or that you have to listen to them all the time or anything like that. But seriously, how can you not be at least a little in to their infectious brand of damn near perfect pop music? It’s practically meant to be mainlined straight into your earholes, sugary, syrupy nuggets of sound.

And it’s for everyone too: music connoisseurs and laymen, pop fans, rappers, punk rockers, metal-heads, jocks, nerds, stoners, tweekers, old people, young people, and so on. You are not too cool to enjoy some ABBA, to bop to it, to dance to it, to move. I’m dancing in my seat right this moment as I write this. Come and join the party and jam to my favorite, “Take a Chance on Me.”

Don’t be that guy that doesn’t like fun.

Daily Jam - En ton av Tystnad (The Sound of Silence)

We stan for ABBA around these parts, and i guess that means solo careers as well.  Anni-Frid Lyngstad released her first solo outing "Frida" in 1971, and it included a lovely, though kind of maudlin, cover of Simon and Garfunkel's "The Sound of Silence" sung in her native Swedish.  I heard this for the first time a couple of years ago, and it's kind of been stuck in my head ever since.  Listen to "En ton av Tystnad" below, our Daily Jam.

Portishead - SOS

A little earlier this year, Portishead released a cover of ABBA's "SOS" that was featured in Ben Wheatley's "High-Rise," and it was really damn good.  The trio just put out a video for the song today, a somber black and white affair, that closes with a quote from the recently murdered British politician Jo Cox.  Watch below.