ABBA family-friendly bike party

Grab your spandex, pull on your capes, and join our family-friendly celebration of ABBA, Sweden's musical geniuses who rose from Eurovision song contest success to conquer the world, via Australia.

It was Australian music fans who in late 1975 demanded that 'Mamma Mia' be released as a single, thanks to falling in love with ABBA's promotional music video which Molly Meldrum added to Countdown on ABC TV.

The band's record label initially said no, to keep the focus on the album, 'ABBA'. But after learning about Australians' strong reactions, released it as a single on 22/09/1975, according to the Kent Music Report, which tracked local music charts. It spent 10 weeks at number one, and was ABBA's second Australian number one after 'I do, I do, I do, I do, I do'. It was then released in other countries, and became a top five hit in at least 10 countries, ABBAsite says.

As ABBA's Benny Andersson, who co-wrote the song with Bjorn Ulvaeus, sums it up, “We have always been grateful to the Australian audience, because that’s when things started to happen.”

Bring anyone you know who loves ABBA or has yet to experience them, and join us for a joyful, slow, social ride from the Street Theatre to see the National Triangle differently.

We head clockwise around the Central Basin of Lake Burley Griffin, stopping at the Jetty on the south bank for refreshments, before returning at the Street. Give us your song requests and we'll blast them from our Partybox speaker we carry on our cargo bike. Here's an example of what our bike parties are like.

We welcome all people on all cycles and scooters. The route is about 7km, is mostly flat (save for the Commonwealth Ave and Kings Ave bridge approaches), and there are toilets at multiple locations along the way.

Photo: ABBA live on stage in Edmonton, Canada, 1979, photographed by Anders Hanser.