Elastica

Elastica were an English alternative rock band that played punk rock, post-punk and new wave-influenced music. They were best known for their 1995 album Elastica, which produced singles that charted in the United Kingdom and the United States.

History

In mid-1992 ex-Suede band members Justine Frischmann and Justin Welch decided to form a group. By the autumn of that year, bassist Annie Holland and guitarist Donna Matthews were added. After initially gigging under names such as "Onk", the band settled on the name "Elastica" in October 1992. Elastica released their first single, "Stutter," in October 1993, which benefited from the promotional efforts of BBC Radio 1 DJ and Deceptive Records label boss Steve Lamacq, who had discovered the band earlier in the year. In 1994, Elastica released two UK Top 20 singles ("Line Up" and "Connection") and performed on numerous radio shows. In addition, Frischmann's relationship with Blur frontman Damon Albarn made tabloid headlines.

Elastica's first LP, Elastica, was released in March 1995, and entered the UK Albums Chart at No. 1; it became the fastest-selling debut album since Oasis' Definitely Maybe and kept the position for another 10 years. The album was preceded by their fourth single "Waking Up" which went to No. 13 on the UK Singles Chart, their highest placing therein.

Elastica theory

The elastica theory is a theory of mechanics of solid materials developed by Leonhard Euler that allows for very large scale elastic deflections of structures. Euler (1744) and Jakob Bernoulli developed the theory for elastic lines (yielding the solution known as the elastica curve) and studied buckling. Certain situations can be solved exactly by elliptic functions. Later elastica theory was generalized by F. and E. Cosserat into a geometric theory with intrinsic directions at each point (1907).

Elastica theory is an example of bifurcation theory. For most boundary conditions several solutions exist simultaneously.

When small deflections of a structure are to be analyzed, elastica theory is not required and an approximate solution may be found using the simpler linear elasticity theory or (for 1-dimensional components) beam theory.

A modern treatise of the planar elastica with full account of bifurcation and instability has been recently presented by Bigoni.

See also

Elastica (album)

Elastica is the debut studio album by English alternative rock band Elastica. It was released on 14 March 1995 through Deceptive Records.

Reception

Elastica hit No. 1 on the UK Albums Chart, becoming, at the time, the fastest-selling debut since Oasis' Definitely Maybe the previous year. The record also did well in the US, peaking at No. 66 on the Billboard Hot 200 and being certified Gold. It was well-received critically and nominated for the Mercury Music Prize.

The album was well-received critically. In their retrospective review, Allmusic praised the album, writing "what makes Elastica such an intoxicating record is not only the way the 16 songs speed by in 40 minutes, but that they're nearly all classics" and that "hardly any new wave band [sic] made records this consistently rocking and melodic."BBC Music wrote "As albums that fall off a genre's radar go, Elastica's eponymous debut ranks high", calling it "a neglected gem" and the "blueprint for what Britpop should sound like".NME it the 191th greatest album of all time in 2013.