Waterloo (1974)

ABBA's "Waterloo" arrived in North America the summer before Grade Seven. Down the street from where I lived was an electronic appliance shop that sold stereo consoles alongside ovens and washing machines. On a pegboard wall above the record bins hung the 45 rpm singles, whose order changed on Tuesdays, based on what C-FUN was playing.

I remember taking a lot of guff for buying this single. Most of my friends were listening to Steve Miller, Led Zeppelin and Elton John, as I was too, but I liked the colours and frequencies in ABBA's song, how they made me feel, so I didn't care.

"But you can hear their accents!" said a girl friend, as if an accent was synonymous with a bad note, as if it's not right for a boy to be listening to a song like "Waterloo".

ABBA went on to sell millions of singles. Unfortunately they never produced another song as good as how I felt while listening to "Waterloo" (though "Knowing Me, Knowing You" was close).