ABBA's garish stage outfits were actually tax-evasion strategy, Björn Ulvaeus reveals

What do Swedish pop phenomenon ABBA and cartoon metal group Dethklok have in common? Both have used investments into elaborate live performance materials in order to avoid paying taxes.

The outfits worn by ABBA during its high point, featuring platform shoes and more sequins than the clothing museum at Graceland, made fans the world over wonder if Swedes were terribly misguided when it came to fashion, or blind. Songwriter and member Björn Ulvaeus agrees with your assessment.

"In my honest opinion we looked like nuts in those years. Nobody can have been as badly dressed on stage as we were," he said.

The revelation came in ABBA: The Official Photo Book, a compilation celebrating the 40 year anniversary of the group's Eurovision victory. Garish outfits have long been tradition at the European pop music competition, but Ulvaeus claims the group's outfits were an economic strategy as well. Swedish law allowed performers to write-off concert outfits, granted that the apparel was so off-putting that it couldn't realistically be worn in public (this sort of law would throw the U.S. Supreme Court into a tizzy, based on what kids are wearing nowadays).

Ulvaeus should know a thing or two about Swedish tax law. He was charged with owing 85 million kroner (more than $13.2 million) in 2007, but an appeals court found him innocent.

Pan-national metal band Dethklok famously tried to avoid taxation during 2006 by dropping millions into its charity performance at the United Celebrities of The World Foundation concert. Much of that money went toward a questionably safe Soviet laser machine, which tragically malfunctioned, cutting the London Philharmonic in half.

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