There's just 250million reasons why the UK still loves ABBA

14 May 2023 - Press release

A brand-new chart from Greatest Hits Radio and PPL reveals the most played ABBA songs of the 21st Century

 

Ever since they hit the Eurovision heights with Waterloo back in 1974, Swedish sensations ABBA have been the soundtrack to our lives. And, in what may be good news for this year's Eurovision winner, this legacy shows no signs of slowing down as on Sunday (14 May) Greatest Hits Radio counts down ABBA's Most Played Songs of the 21st Century.

The countdown is hosted by chart show legend Mark Goodier and has been compiled exclusively for the station by UK music licensing company PPL, who have used official performance data from across UK TV and Radio to bring together the 20 ABBA songs that we have loved to listen to the most this century.

You can listen to the chart this Sunday evening and find out which ABBA classic is at number one but in the meantime did you know:

• Waterloo is played on average nine times per day across UK radio and television
• In 2022, Dancing Queen was played an average of 18 times a day across UK radio and television
• An ABBA song is played on a UK radio station or television channel on average every nine minutes or around seven times per hour
• ABBA has generated over 250million seconds of airplay on UK radio and TV in the 21^st Century to date. In other words, of the 22 years of this century so far, ABBA has been playing continuously in the UK for more than a third of them – that's eight years!

Greatest Hits Radio's Mark Goodier commented: 'It's hard to think of any other band whose careers started in the last century that has dominated our airwaves as much in this century as ABBA. It's testament to their incredible songwriting that people of all ages still love, listen to and appreciate all of those wonderful hit singles. It's going to be an absolute pleasure to count down this chart this weekend and I can't wait to reveal which song is at Number One!'

Peter Leathem OBE, CEO PPL said: 'It is a privilege to continue ensuring that our performer members are fairly rewarded for their recordings when they are enjoyed by millions across the UK and beyond. The sheer volume of airplay that ABBA still garners across UK TV and Radio is witness to the power of music to embed and endure in the national psyche. We were delighted to provide the data on ABBA's performance in the 21st century so far, and continue to support ABBA's Bjorn Ulvaeus on his Session tool, designed to capture song information directly as performers lay down future hits in the studio.