Ace Of Base 'Always Have, Always Will'

Chart Peak: 12

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Swedish pop sensations Ace Of Base are fast following in the footsteps of fellow Swede legends Abba - their debut album Happy Nation sold 21 million copies worldwide and they have already won four World Music Awards.

Another Abba reference? It's a slightly odd note they've written there; odd to talk up the the sales of their first album when this track was from their third, and seems a bit desperate to claim the entirely sales-based World Music Awards (all four of which were won for "Biggest-Selling Scandinavian Recording Artists Of The Year") when they had won at the more respectable Billboard awards. The analogy also falls down in that this was the group's penultimate hit in the UK, and their last to bother the Top 20. They did continue to record in the new century (though, unlike Abba, they've changed the lineup) but the British public seem to have lost interest rather abruptly.

It's a bit unfortunate because 'Always Have, Always Will' is one of their more likable singles. Though it's obviously intended to be the Motown pastiche that non long-running act can resist,  it was in fact co-written by Mike Chapman. Younger readers might need reminding that he was part of the Chinnichap writing team who supplied many a seventies hit to Mud, Sweet and Suzi Quatro, and you can hear some traces of his glam stompers in there too. The inane but passable lyric was apparently a replacement for an original text about a murderer; that was thought insufficiently commercial.

Also appearing on: Now 25, 27, 28, 33, 41
Available on: Singles of the 90s

Ace Of Base 'Beautiful Life'

Chart Peak: 15

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Swedish quartet Ace Of Base have sold a simple staggering 19 million copies of their debut album Happy Nation... This track, 'Beautiful Life', is the first big hit from their new project.

It seems like a fairly specialist definition of "big hit" that encompasses this Number 15 but not 'Lucky Love', which peaked at 20 and hardly seemed to be off MTV Europe back then. It was the first hit from the album in the US, though, where it also peaked at the same position as it did here.

Reading through the tracklisting, I thought this one would be a bit of a departure from the dance sound of the previous few tracks, but this is actually a lot more Eurodance than I remember it. It was apparently written on New Year's Day 1994 so maybe Jonas Berggren (the one with a beard who has nothing to do in the video) had been out clubbing the night before? It would certainly fit in with the happy-clappy mood of the song, even if it doesn't explain why that video shows them being coughed up from a blonde woman's mouth.

Also appearing on: 25, 27, 28, 41, 42
Available on: The Bridge

Ace Of Base 'The Sign'

Chart Peak: 2

YouTube

I'd been meaning to do one of the 1994 albums for a while, both because it's an interesting pop year and as a tribute to AcerBen's fascinating Pop Unlimited 1994, which offers us a week-by-week snapshot of charts and Top Of The Pops. And his most recent post at time of writing also embeds the original TV commercial for the album, so I've borrowed it here. It goes without saying that this will contain some spoilers as to which other tracks feature on the album.

Swedish foursome Ace Of Base have sold millions of records in the last year all over Europe... They recently had 2 American Top 10 singles at the same time - 'The Sign' (which had reached No.2 in the UK by 27/2/94) & 'All That She Wants'.

A nice informative note there, which omits only to mention that this track ultimately topped the US chart for six non-consecutive weeks; a level of success which surely vindicates the decision to record extra tracks for the North American version of their debut album. Whilst the single didn't perform quite so well over here, it was a big hit and helped a re-issued album to outperform its original incarnation (it finally topped the chart after the next single, but that's another story).

All the rest of this might make it more surprising that I have no memory at all of hearing this song at the time. Perhaps I should explain that 1994 was a year when I (re)connected with pop music: I must have restarted listening to music radio (well, Capital FM) around the start of the year, then shifted to our local BBC station GLR when I helped decorate my new bedroom later in the year. In the autumn we got cable TV for the first time and as MTV Europe was broadcast in the UK at the time I became quite familiar with their hits from 1995-6 but somehow this particular one passed me by, and I've only more recently become acquainted with it.

It'd make good copy to say that this had quickly become one of my all-time favourites, but sadly they're not a group I've ever been able to warm to and this one's no exception. There's something a bit too happy-clappy about them that seems to get on my nerves although I'd be at a loss to say why when other insubstantial acts don't bother me so much. Perhaps it treads the tightrope between seriousness and silly too awkwardly (the song and video have been interpreted by some as depicting a woman who joins a religious order to escape an abusive relationship) or maybe it's just this particular era's dance-pop sounds I don't like. Still, I have to admit this is better than a lot of Now 50.

Also appearing on: Now 25, 28, 33, 41, 42
Available on: Happy Nation