The Name of the Game
| “The Name of the Game” | |||||
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| Single by ABBA from the album The Album |
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| Released | October 17, 1977 (Sweden) October 22, 1977 (UK) December 24, 1977 (US) |
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| Format | 7" Single | ||||
| Genre | Pop/Europop | ||||
| Length | 4:51 | ||||
| Writer(s) | Björn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson, Stig Anderson |
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| Producer | Björn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson |
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| Certification | Gold (UK) | ||||
| ABBA singles chronology | |||||
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"The Name of the Game" is a 1977 song by Swedish pop group ABBA, and was released as the first single from the group's album, The Album, their fifth for Polar and their fourth for Epic and Atlantic.
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History
"The Name of the Game", first called "A Bit of Myself", was the first song to be recorded for ABBA's fifth studio album. It was their most complex composition yet — with Agnetha Fältskog and Anni-Frid Lyngstad sharing the lead vocals but with solo passages from both women — and contained the influences of the laid-back California sound of the day.
The opening riff on bass and synthesiser is inspired by Stevie Wonder's "I Wish" from 1976 album Songs in the Key of Life, and both Andersson and Ulvaeus have acknowledged being influenced and inspired by Wonder's music during this era of ABBA's career.
A preliminary version of "The Name of the Game" was worked into the 1977 feature film ABBA: The Movie. The song had not yet reached its complete version, but when it was eventually finished, it was released as the lead single from The Album in October 1977. Originally, another track entitled "Hole in Your Soul" was intended for release, but those plans were soon shelved. "The Name of the Game" was released with "I Wonder (Departure)" as the B-side. This B-side was one of several songs written for the mini-musical The Girl with the Golden Hair, written by Björn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson and originally performed by ABBA on their 1977 world tour.
Reception
"The Name of the Game" was not as successful as ABBA's previous singles since 1975. It was more of a top 10 success than a number one-smash, hence why it only topped the UK charts.
It did reach the top 10 almost everywhere else where ABBA were successful, including Australia, West Germany, Sweden and so on, while in the United States, where ABBA had arguably not been embraced as strongly as elsewhere, "The Name of the Game" peaked at number 12.
An edited version of "The Name of the Game", which omitted the entire second verse of the song, reducing the length of the track from its original 4:51 to 3:58, was released on a promotional single in the USA. The U.S. radio edit of "The Name of the Game" then apparently - by mistake - found its way onto the 1982 Polar Music compilation The Singles: The First Ten Years, and then onto a number of hits packages issued on both vinyl and CD in the 1980s and early 1990s. It also appears on the original 1992 version of the group's ABBA Gold: Greatest Hits album. Not until the 1999 remastered edition of ABBA Gold did the song appear in its entirety on that compilation.
When PolyGram released the first digitally remastered CD version of The Album in 1997, the fact that one of the nine tracks was nearly a minute shorter than it was supposed to be somehow managed to elude the remastering engineers - the U.S. edit was again used by mistake and the first edition was subsequently withdrawn.[1]
"The Name of the Game" was sampled in 1996 by the Fugees for their hit "Rumble in the Jungle", the first time that an ABBA song had been legally sampled by another act. [1]
Chart positions
| Chart (1977) | Position |
|---|---|
| Australian ARIA Singles Chart | 6 |
| Austrian Singles Chart | 12 |
| Belgian VRT Top 30 Singles Chart | 2 |
| Canadian Singles Chart | 15 |
| Dutch Top 40 | 2 |
| Finnish Singles Chart | 5 |
| French IFOP Singles Chart | 12 |
| German Singles Chart | 7 |
| Irish Singles Chart | 2 |
| Mexican Singles Chart | 10 |
| New Zealand RIANZ Singles Chart | 4 |
| Norwegian VG-lista Singles Chart | 3 |
| South African Singles Chart | 3 |
| Swedish Singles Chart | 2 |
| Swiss Singles Chart | 6 |
| UK Singles Chart | 1 |
| U.S. Billboard Hot 100 | 12 |
| Zimbabwean Singles Chart | 4 |
| Preceded by "Yes Sir, I Can Boogie" by Baccara |
UK Singles Chart number one single November 5, 1977 - November 26, 1977 |
Succeeded by "Mull of Kintyre" by Wings |
| Preceded by "Way Down" by Elvis Presley |
Eurochart Hot 100 Singles number one single November 10, 1977 - December 26, 1977 |
Cover versions
- A cover of the song was featured on the 1977 album Top of the Pops, Volume 62, using uncredited studio musicians and singers. The same recording was later featured on the ABBA tribute album Knowing Me, Knowing You, credited to Top of the Poppers.
- On the 1995 New Zealand compilation Abbasalutely the song is covered by Shaynie & Fifi '95 (a one-off duo comprising Shayne Carter and Fiona McDonald).
- The SAS Band - Spike Edney's All Stars - covered the song on their 1997 eponymous debut album with English singer Chris Thompson on lead vocals.
- Swedish pop group A*Teens covered the song on their debut album in 1999, The ABBA Generation. Their version, like the U.S. release, omits the second verse.
- The 1999 album, ABBA: A Tribute - The 25th Anniversary Celebration, includes a rendition by Swedish singer Irma which also eliminates the second verse.
- A dance cover by Abbacadabra was released through Almighty Records in the late 1990s.
- Musician/songwriter Pamela McNeill recorded a slow ballad version of the song on her Tribute To ABBA album, which was produced by her husband Dugan McNeill.
- A electronica/dance version was recorded by Euphorica on the album ABBA Dance in 2003. However, this version omits some of the lyrics from the verses.
- On the 2004 tribute album Abbalicious, which features ABBA covers performed by U.S. drag queens, the song is covered by June Bug.[2]
- American-born German singer Sydney Youngblood covered the song for the German compilation ABBA Mania.
- Swedish musician Nils Landgren includes a cover on his album Funky ABBA.
- A cover of the song by Eurosonic can be found on the 2006 chill out music compilation ABBA Chill Out.
- Studio 99 did a full version on their Studio 99 Perform A Tribute To ABBA, Vol. 1 album.
- In the stage musical Mamma Mia!, the song is performed by the characters of Sophie and Bill. In the context of the musical, the song is sung, mainly, by Sophie, who is trying to persuade Bill not to talk to Donna about his possible paternity to Sophie. They come to the possible conclusion that he might be her father and he decides to walk her down the aisle at the wedding. Some of the lyrics in the song are altered to suit the story. In the 2008 movie adaptation of Mamma Mia!, Amanda Seyfried in (the role of Sophie) performs the song in a deleted scene with Stellan Skarsgård.
Live cover performances, samples, appearances/references in other media, etc.
- The song is sung in the Mamma Mia! musical by the characters of Sky and Sophie. In the context of the musical, the song is used when Sky and Sophie reminisce about how they felt when they met each other and they express how much they love each other.
- Dutch eurodance-group Vengaboys sampled this song in their hit "Boom Boom Boom Boom" and ABBA was later given co-writing credits, after some threats of suing.
- Author Erin Smith and fiance Jonathon Grosskopf named this song as "Our Song" after Smith continued to quote lyrics from it at Grosskopf.
References
- ^ ABBA - The Complete Studio Recordings, Palm, Carl Magnus, pg126.
- ^ http://www.figjament.com/figjam_records_v1/abbalicious_pages/abbalicious_the_cd.html
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