50 years after it was first released, ABBA's 'Fernando' soundtracks one of Stranger Things most terrifying season five scenes
From Kate Bush's 'Running up that Hill' to Metallica'a 'Master of Puppet's', Stranger Things has a way with sourcing old school soundtracks and ricocheting them back into the cultural zeitgeist. For it's last season, released in full on the 26th of November 2025, turned to one of Sweden's most iconic bands: ABBA.
Featuring in that terrifying demogorgon scene in episode two of season five, the slow-build Fernando had us all on our seat in a similar wain to 'Running up that Hill'. In a recent MovieZine interview, the Duffer brothers – the creators behind Stranger Things – said: "We must've tried 20, 30 different songs and that ['Fernando'] just felt right." In the end, it was the rhythm and cinematic quality to the song, alongside some vague comedic elements and a good character fit for Karen, that landed the song a spot on the soundtrack.
In the pantheon of ABBA's music mastery, Fernando has a tendency to be forgotten. First released on ABBA's 1976 album Arrival alongside ’Dancing Queen’, ’Knowing Me, Knowing You’ and ’Money, Money, Money’, it was the band's first single to top American music charts.
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Photo: Ola Lager courtesy of Universal
Speaking on how the song came to be, Björn Ulvaeus comments: “On a beautiful summer night I was lying flat on my back on the jetty at my country house. I was looking at a starry, completely unobscured sky and it was as though the words were handed to me from above. I only had to reach out and grab them - “there was something in the air that night…”"
And there's definitely something strange in the air as we bundle up to venture through the membrane one last time to defeat Vecna.