Thank you for the music

Those naughty scandinavians certainly know how to tease. Ten years after turning down the GDP of Ghana to reform for a world tour, Sweden's finest exports (after Volvo and hot blondes) are umm-ing and ahh-ing about a potential reunion.

It's almost thirty years since ABBA trudged morosely out of limelight, leaving a harmonious hole in all our hearts. They may have gone, but they were not forgotten, with enough remasters and reissues to keep subsequent generations of music lovers happy.

Over the intervening years their astonishing ouevre (excluding Bang-A-Boomerang and Dum Dum Diddle) has been reappraised with the kind of loving attention to detail that makes Michaelangelo look like a marketplace caricaturist.

At the time, ABBA was easily dismissed as the pinnacle of Eurocheese - like BabyBel with a knack for complicated harmonies. Unfairly lumped in with Baccara and Boney M, the complexity and finesse of their output was easily overlooked.

To the uninitiated, the songs are little more than formulaic pap - catchy melody and predictable structure: verse chorus verse chorus bridge key change chorus fade. But if it was really that simple, music journalists would be busy discussing the musical legacy of Steps and S Club 14.

Now, it's a different story, with musicians as diverse as The Edge and three different Brians (Eno, Higgins and May) stepping forward to doff their white sombreros in ABBA's direction.

When Mamma Mia was developed into a (record-breaking) West End musical, Benny and Bjorn spent months in the studio with original audio engeineer Michael B Tretow, trying to figure out how the hell they made the records sound so good. The harmonies were so dense and complicated they actually had to be forensically deconstructed to give the musical's cast any hope of capturing the signature ABBA sound. It's also the reason why ABBA-week on any music talent show is about as enjoyable as reaching into a faulty garbage disposal unit to rescue a wedding ring.

ABBA's unique selling point was the way they brought together a triptych of talents - songwriting, vocals and production. There are countless groups that can manage two out of three, but the Swedish superstars were the only ones to successfully nail all three.

For decades now, the fans have had a dream of seeing the Swedish sixty-somethings squeezed back into those unflattering spandex outfits and recapturing the melodic magic once again. Sadly, two whole generations have had to settle for ironic Australian cover bands for their fix of the live ABBA experience.

Finally, it seems as though there may be a glimmer of hope that the fab foursome may be on the verge of reuniting. In a new interview with The Times, Benny and Bjorn have hinted that a reunion is not out of the question: “Yeah, why not? I don’t know if the girls sing anything any more. It’s not a bad idea, actually.”

OK, so it's hardly an effusive confirmation, but it's better than flat-out refusal. The pop landscape is a pretty uninspiring place right now, dominated by plummy electro-tarts, dull bedsit rockers and ten-a-penny reality TV stars. Here's hoping that ABBA can finally reconcile their pasts and find a way to come together. Let's face it, it's a richer man's world thanks to songs like this:

Stop right now, thank you very much

George Santayana famously said "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." As a philosopher and poet, he was most likely speaking about war or the subjugation of human rights. But his powerful words are just as prescient when applied to the horrifying threat of another imminent Spice Girls reunion.

If you're feeling a sense of deja vu, in addition to creeping pernicious dread, it's probably because we've been here before. Only two years ago (although it feels like much, much longer) the rowdy fivesome congregated at the 02 arena to bellow their plans to reconquer the world all over again, having buried the hatchet once and for all.

They maintained that any animosity was just water under the bridge, and they were as tight as they'd been when they first started out, looking like a bunch of badly-styled ASBO-dodgers on their way to a hen night in Chigwell.

Proving that people are willing to buy the same old shit if it comes in nicer packaging, one million people tried to get hold of tickets for the official comeback concert, which sold out in 38 seconds. Having successfully thrown the chum into the waters and inspired a feeding frenzy, the cartoonish coven released tickets for an entire world tour and announced their plans for a big comeback single.

Unfortunately, the single was a bit of a flop, with record shops lumbered with crates of unsold copies of 'Headlines'. Likewise, backstage backstabbing led to the 'girls' (a term currently being investigated under the trades descriptions act) taking an early bath.

Officially, they claimed that family commitments were the reason for them cancelling dates in Australia, China, South Africa and Argentina, but the press reported that relations between the quarrelsome quintet were about as cordial as the Sugababes Christmas party. Gigs were scrapped, tickets refunded and fans royally pissed off. By this point, the entire world was hoping that the girls would limp off into the sunset like a mortally wounded animal in cheap leopard-print.

So it's with a palpable sense of dread that we now find ourselves contemplating the possibility of a second Spice Girls reunion. The reason for such a counter-intuitive occurrence is unclear, except to say that all five must be pretty bored now.

Victoria Beckham occasionally oils herself up to pose for Armani, Mel B has been living in a council house with a camera crew, and Geri Halliwell must have realised that Ugenia Lavender books only take up half an hour of your time, especially when you have a willing ghost-writer at your beck and call.

With Girls Aloud, The Saturdays and Girls Can't Catch currently restoring some essential credibility to the much maligned girl-group genre, maybe it's appropriate for the the grand-dames of girl-pop to give it one last go and remind them all how it's done. Because let's face it, if you're going to bicker, bitch and claw each other's eyes out, you want to be sure you're doing it like a pro.

Duncan's blue period

These days, if you're a celebrity with a product to sell, it's no longer enough to pop up on a chatshow and press the flesh with whoever happens to read the questions off the autocue. You have to give something of yourself - a confessional tidbit that the papers can claim as an exclusive, and it doesn't matter how personal the details are. In fact, the more explicit the better.

This weekend, Katie Price proved herself the master of this dark art, using a recent miscarriage in an attempt to attack the alleged insensitivity of her estranged husband. Worried that he was winning the majority of the public's support simply by getting on with his life, Katie decided it was time to get her acrylic claws out.

It seems that the management of recently reformed boyband Blue may be advising a similar strategy. With a major tour to promote, singer Duncan James has revealed in an exclusive interview with the News of the World that he's bisexual. Despite crafting a reputation as a permanently priapic ladies man, it turns out that Duncan was into more than just 'One Love'. "Yes I was labelled a womaniser, and yes I did sleep with a lot of women. But there were tell-tale signs I was that way inclined. I've always been theatrical and loved being on stage."

Aside from describing himself as 'that way inclined', and his use of 'theatrical' as a one-size-fits-all euphemism, Duncan claims to be happy and at peace with his lifestyle. It also means that twice as many fans have a chance of being invited backstage at the forthcoming concerts. So that's good news all round.

Following last month's shock announcement that the reunion was 'partly about the money', I'll be interested to see what the other three boys in Blue can come up with when the News of the World come knocking for further exclusives. Failing that, I suppose the dubious tabloid could always just tap the lads' phones and see what comes up.