MIKE Watson travelled to Sweden with American singer Larry Finnegan in 1964. He never left – and the move turned out to be one of the best decisions of his life.
In 1971 Watson started working the bans we now know as Abba (simply called Bjorn & Benny, Agnetha & Anni-Frid at the time).
He would go on to become one of the group’s session musicians, recording bass on renowned tracks such as SOS, Super Trouper and The Winner Takes It All.
And in 1974 he was playing bass on stage when they won the Eurovision Song Contest.
It’s a far stretch from Sheffield where he grew up but now Watson is travelling a little bit closer to home as he prepares to play in Glasgow for the first time in his career.
He’ll be playing bass in Arrival From Sweden, which he says is the closest anyone will ever come today to seeing Abba live.
The group, which wears exact replicas of the costumes Abba themselves wore on stage, have already toured more than 70 countries, with 80 sell-out shows in America alone since 2005.
They’re playing Glasgow’s Hydro tonight and Watson said it’s not a show Abba fans will want to miss.
He told The National: “The girls and boys at the front, they have exact copies of Abba costumes so when you see it it’s just like seeing Abba. They’re very good. And it’s not using any backing tracks.
"This is all live – all the singing, all the playing.
“People coming to see an Abba tribute want it to be near as possible and this is an exact copy – and they’re really good musicians.”
Watson (above) first got in touch with the group members after working on a single with soon-to-be Abba singer and Swedish Princess Anni-Frid Lyngstad.
It was after this that the royal formed a group with the other members of Abba. “I met Bjorn and Benny because they were in different groups around in the middle of the 1960s,” Watson said.
“I became a studio musician in 1969-70 and that’s when Bjorn and Benny started as producers for Polar Records. I started working with them in different productions.”
During all that time, Watson never shied away from live performances though. He scored two No 2 hits in Sweden with his band Lee Kings and supported acts such as Elton John when they came to the Scandinavian country.
Having become well-known in the Swedish musical scene, Watson was keen to stay. “If I came back to England, it would be like starting all over again,” he said.
Despite their astronomical success, the bassist said he didn’t realise the likes of SOS, Super Trouper and Mama Mia would become the hits we all know now.
“At the time it was just another session,” he said. “I was doing like three or four days in the studio back then.
⏰ Here are your event times* for Arrival: The Music of ABBA at the OVO Hydro on 28 December! 1830: Doors open 1930: Show starts 2300: Show finishes *times subject to change More info ➡️ https://t.co/AC4SPFqcc5 pic.twitter.com/eLXom8afjm
— OVO Hydro (@OVOHydro) December 23, 2022
“When we played the likes of SOS the girls were never in the studio. It was just Bjorn and Benny. Bjorn would be with an acoustic guitar and he’d sing a few lyrics and the melody. Benny would be at the piano, we’d have a drummer, a bassist and another guitar player. So we just made these backing tracks, starting at 10 o’clock, and we’d play all day, trying out different things for each of the songs that we did.”
Watson said he never actually listened to the finished product until the studio company sent him the final LP.
He continued: “But Bjorn, when he heard the finished song [SOS] he said he thought it was very special. But I never thought 50 years on we would still be playing them.
“And if you’ve got the radio on anywhere in the world it’s Abba. It’s unbelievable.”
Those on the lookout for Abba trivia will be intrigued to know it was Watson who was Napoleon on the album cover of 1974’s Waterloo.
In the artwork, he’s seen with his back to the band, in Napoleon’s famous bicorne hat as Benny Andersson, Frida, Agnetha Faltskog and Bjorn Ulvaeus look to the camera.
“That my modelling career – it was very short,” he jokes.
“They phoned me one morning, it must have been February ’74, just before the Eurovision Song Contest and they said we are going to do some photo sessions tomorrow and we need a little guy to stand in the background as Napoleon. So we went out to an old castle and we took the photos.”
