Popscene at Passion of the Weiss: Elastica - "Elastica"

Peep my latest popscene feature over at Passion of the Weiss, about Elastica's self-titled debut. Justine Frischmann is best known for driving Damon Albarn to write "Tender", but her band were pretty damn fantastic in their heyday too. Click the excerpt below to read the whole thing.

Elastica are thieves with taste, cribbing the best parts from their favourite Buzzcocks, Blondie and Wire records and refining them into spiky punk-pop gems. The band learned from the best to prize pithiness in songwriting, so they omit unnecessary bridges and repetitive hooks, running through 16 songs in 38 frenetic minutes. Never is it more evident than on sub-two- minute gems like “Annie” and the self-explanatory “Vaseline”. As with their influences, the singles are the best tracks: “Stutter” is a viciously dismissive kiss-off to an impotent boyfriend with a fantastic chorus, and “Connection” is a superbly simple and catchy tribute to either fame or love. Album tracks like the detached creep of “2:1” and the scathing “S.O.F.T.” show the band’s diversity, while Frischmann’s ’s icy cooing perfectly fits the band’s sharp, hooky playing.