No shame. ABBA as guilty pleasure is some tired, old rockist bullshit. Let your poptimist flag fly, you crazy Swede, you.

It's all the Eurovision floating through here.

Reasons to Love ABBA:

(1.) Like more intense forms of pop music, their sound and songs communicate a combination of an exaggerated emotional state with a sonic "overplus of meaning" -- their work is intrinsically spiritual, as it combines the blurred edges of romantic ecstasy at a level of divinity.

(2.) The Clash lost their gear once, and ABBA without hesitation loaned them their equipment to play the show. The Clash may have been shit-talking the band before this, who knows. But they probably sure didn't afterwards.

(3.) "Mamma Mia" is going to be a horrible movie, but OMG ABBA sounds FREAKING AMAZING on the Neptune's sound system during the preview!

I'm not so thrilled by all the Eurovision, but ABBA still is one of my faves.

Abba is the fucking GREATEST. If you don't like Abba, you don't have ears. Those records sound INCREDIBLE. I dunno about "spiritual" but "sonic overplus of meaning" is a pretty great phrase for it. Abba is punk as fuck, too.

I was singing along to Fernando (under my breath, not with my wrists above my head) at a Craft Fair the other day, With My Girlfriend, and was asked by one of the stall owners how long I had 'Liked Abba' for. It turned out she did not mean my penchant for cheesy Scandinavian pop. So of course I camped it up and over exaggerated the existing English accent. My good lady found it funny. The lady's mother, who was also with us - not so much.