ABBA's Agnetha 'MY RECLUSE DAYS ARE OVER'

The Super Trouper opens up about her darkest days with the band and who saved her

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After ’70s super-group ABBA released their first album in 40 years in November, it seemed the impossible had finally happened.

The last time the four members of the Swedish pop band – Agnetha Fältskog, Anni-Frid Lyngstad, Björn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson – had tried to record music together, in 1982, they walked away from the studio with an album half-finished and never returned.

The decades rolled by and, with Agnetha reportedly a recluse who could not be lured from the island where she’d retreated to escape the pressures of fame, the hopes of the fab four ever making a comeback became diminishingly small.

But nothing is necessarily forever, including Agnetha’s so-called hermit lifestyle.

“Much has been written that I am a recluse and a mysterious woman,” says the now 71-year-old grandmother. “Maybe I was a recluse for some years. I was so tired once ABBA was over, and just wanted to be calm and with my children. I married, was in ABBA, had my children, divorced, all in 10 years. I wonder how I managed it, but I was young.”

Suggestions she’s the Greta Garbo of Swedish pop music, cowering in dark corners and unable to connect with the outside world, however, are far from the truth.

“I go shopping and out to restaurants with friends,” she smiles. “I don’t mind signing autographs, as long as there’s not a queue forming…”