A*Teens

Although the A*Teens were sometimes described as a manufactured pop band, its members had known each other for several years before the group came together in a dance class in Stockholm, Sweden, in the late 1990s. The band formed when the group of four friends—Dahni Lennevald, Sara Lumholdt, Amit Paul, and Marie Serneholt—heard about an open audition for a band to perform Abba songs. As Amit Paul recalled in an interview with Hip Online, "November '98, we went to this dance school and there was an audition and we went to the audition together. So we danced for them and answered questions for them. It went very well." Although the group's vocal abilities seemed to be a secondary concern, its fresh-faced, energetic appeal was obvious from the start.

At the time A*Teens formed, each of the new band members was between 14 and 15 years old and still in secondary school. Despite their academic schedules, however, the band had its debut album, The Abba Generation, ready for release in fewer than six months. When its first single was released in May of 1999—an updated version of Abba's "Mamma Mia"—A*Teens became that year's biggest music sensation in Sweden. The song debuted at number one on the Swedish singles chart and eventually became the best-selling single of the year. When the album was released on the heels of "Mamma Mia," it proved equally popular. Logging five weeks at number one on the album charts, The Abba Generation eventually earned triple-platinum status for its sales in Sweden.