Powerpop - Robyn Hitchcock

Well, you don't need me to tell you that Robyn Hitchcock is one of the finest songwriters Britain ever produced, or that his group the Soft Boys (featuring Kimberley Rew on guitar) were the best band of the post-punk era. These things are obvious - simple statements of fact.

So rich is Hitchcock's back catalogue, however, that there are some overlooked gems in there. And none of them are greater than this song. In 1984 Hitchcock released a 12-inch single on which the lead song was an okay copy of the Byrds' version of 'Bells of Rhymney' (lyrics by Idris Davies). And hiding behind it was this swooning piece of autumnal melancholia, 'Falling Leaves'. Honestly, it's gorgeous.

Powerpop - Kimberley Rew

What a very strange career Kimberley Rew has had. His best known work came with Katrina and the Waves, who gave us 'Walking on Sunshine' in 1985 and the last-ever British winner of Eurovision, 'Love Shine a Light', in 1997. But for the likes of you and me, of course, he's most revered for his epic guitar-playing with the Soft Boys, one of the great live bands of the post-punk years.

Somewhere between those two groups, he also released some solo stuff, starting with the 1980 single 'Stomping All Over the World'. And it's one of my favourite-ever records: a perfect, classically constructed pop song with slightly skewed lyrics that builds into an irresistible hook. Two minutes and ten seconds - that's all you need.

Like Knox's 'Gigolo Aunt', this was produced by Pat Collier at the Alaska studio.

This is one of a series of posts celebrating the poppier end of the post-punk period in Britain. Much of this stuff was neither cool nor popular at the time, but it was what I was listening to, and I worry that too much of it is being lost to history.