ABBA In Helvmark: 1973

The first tentative steps into superstardom…
Helvmark’s pop music scene as well as being dominated by the giant acts of the UK and the US always had a healthy relationship with acts from the Netherlands, Germany and Scandinavia. With Agnetha Fältskog already enjoying success on the charts (and to a certain degree the Hep Stars), Polydor Records Helvmark signed ABBA on February 15th 1973. However, until 1974 ABBA were known as Bjorn + Benny, Anna + Frida, or variants thereof.

At the end of February, People Need Love b/w Merry Go Round was released. It was picked up the HR-P3 programme One To Watch and it charted in March 1973 reaching #20 on the HelvTop and #17 on the HitList.

June saw their first entry into the HelvTop Top 10 with Ring, Ring b/w Rock’n’Roll Band. ABBA made their first promotional trip of Helvmark appearing on the HT-1 shows Jenny (performing Ring, Ring and He Is Your Brother), TopHits (performing Ring, Ring); the HT-2 show Det’n Erik! (performing Ring, Ring) and HR-P3’s Tips Of The Future. Ring Ring hits #6 on the HelvTop and #5 on the HitList during July.

The LP Ring Ring is released in August and gets to #34 on the HelvLP chart.


In November He Is Your Brother b/w Santa Rosa is released having reached #10 on the HitList in October. The single is their biggest yet reaching #5 on the HelvTop in December.

ABBA In Helvmark

HelvmarkToday broadcast an ABBA special called ABBA In Helvmark on HT-3 at 20:00 on Saturday 1st November 2008. What follows are the accompanying blog entries for the programme with all the info. As a special bonus all of the official Polydor Helvmark single and album covers are also shown in their full glory.

ABBA (Agnetha Fältskog, Björn Ulvæus, Benny Andersson, Anni-Frid Lyngstad) were the biggest group in the world throughout the latter half of the 1970s. In Helvmark, they are still the biggest musical act of all time even surpassing the Beatles. We will now take a year by year look at their career especially during their active period of 1973 to 1983.

A brief note about the charts during this time. For sales there was the HelvTop (singles) and the HelvLP (albums) charts. Another official chart was the HelvskRádio HitList which was a Top 20 of the most played and requested tracks during the week. The entire Top 20 was broadcast on HR-P3 on Wednesday evenings until 1988.

Abbreviations:

HR = Helvmarks Rádio the state radio broadcaster of Helvmark where P3 was (and still is) the main channel for popular music. HT = Helvmarks Television, the state television broadcaster, during the 1970s there was only HT the channels HT-1 and HT-2. HT-1 was the English language entertainment channel and was the most popular channel. HT-2 showed a mixture of Helvish programmes and English regional programmes. HT-3 came along in 1980 followed by Independent Television in 1981.

Welcome to Helvmark!

Helvmark is a group of 7 islands in the North sea situated in a key position between Germany, Denmark, Netherlands and the United Kingdom. It is part of the Scanic block and is a full member of the EU and the Eurozone. It is one of the wealthiest nations in the Western Europe due to the wealth of its natural resources.

The population of Helvmark is 7.26 million (2002) and it’s capital is Helvdovi which has a population of 1.3 million. Other notable cities include Westhampton, Cosnofen and Cúvenbor. There are 11 regions ranging from the Helvdovi Region with a population of 1.9m to the islands of Róna (Rónaømefir) with a population of 110,000.

The country is a Constitutional Monarchy with Queen Margerit as the Head of State. The main parliament is called the Borgerligshus (lit. House of Commoners) and currently has 89 ministers. The secondary house is called Sepöhus (lit. Watch House) which has 45 ministers. Each region has its own Government called the Amstregering (County Government) which has its own powers over education, business etc. All towns and cities have their own councils which take of local needs and issues.

The official languages of Helvmark are Helvish which is spoken as a first language by 40% of the population and English which is spoken as a first language by 58% of the population. There are also official local minority languages spoken by 2% of the population including Danish and Icelandic. The National Language Framework is complex as each region can decide on the principal language or to be bilingual (except for Helvdovi Region which is Bilingual) but certain national institutions have to be bilngual throughout the country.

Helvmark is wired up for the 21^st Century and beyond. Over 70% of households have broadband and 99% have at least one television which is now completely digital (30% of households have Cable and 19% have satellite). There are four main television broadcasters – the state broadcaster HT (Helvmarks Television), t4h Television 4 Helvmark, FIVE Helvmark and Network 6 Helvmark. There is also a thriving radio industry where there are 6 national radio stations.

Leisure is taken seriously in Helvmark as is the shopping!

For more indepth info check out this more indepth site.

Welcome to my blog!

Welcome to the blog of the HT3 Programme Helvmark Today. HT3 is the regional channel of Helvmarks Television, the state broadcaster of the fictitious country of Helvmark.

Helvmark is a country created by me, Phillip Darlington, for my daughter. It is a group of islands in the North Sea situated near Denmark and is part of Scandinavia. The next post will describe it in more detail!

The purpose of this blog is to show various details of Helvmark. Coming up is a history of ABBA releases by Polydor Helvmark between 1983 and 1984 and the history of the Helvmark Song Festival (Helvmarksangfestival).