Ok, my favourite moment in pop so far this decade kicks in about two thirds of the way through Jens Lekman’s brilliant single Black Cab. All of a sudden the main theme cuts and from nowhere comes a beautiful piece of harpsichord that sounds like it has come from another planet.

The sample is actually from a song called There’s Something on my mind by New York 60s popsters The Left Banke and is a reminder, in case we ever needed one, that in spite of The Stranglers’ Golden Brown, harpsichords can sound amazing in pop songs.

Listening to it Black Cab the other day reminded me quite how lucky I was to own about five Left Banke albums in my collection. For some inexplicable reasons it is now virtually impossible to buy a Left Banke CD at all. It seems incredible that in a world of instant music downloads and online music stores that some of the most heart-stoppingly beautiful music ever can only be bought used via Amazon for at least £30.

I first fell in love with Left Banke in the 80s when Bam Caruso records - a contender for my favourite indie label of al time – issued most of their music on a pair of vinyl albums. They had stunning tunes which could easily have graced mid 60s Beatle albums, but instead of guitars they used supposedly archaic instruments like Harpsichords and Clavinets and decorated those tunes with to die for strings.

The song that everyone knows is Walk Away Renee which went on top be covered by The Four Tops and even brought a bit of light relief to a Billy Bragg album. While The Four tops version is amazing the Left Banke’s original is in a different stratosphere. The surge of strings as the band ploughs into that killer chorus reduces me to tears of joy on a weekly basis.

Ironically Renee is only about the fifth best thing they did. My personal favourite is She Will Call You Up Tonight, a more up-tempo number than Rene which not only boasts a beautiful piano riff but also has a completely unexpected and highly unusual break in the middle. You can get an idea of how wonderful it is by listening to Susanna Hoffs great cover of the song here.

The band’s second single, Pretty Ballerina is my other favourite – a genius pop song with a very distinctive beat and once again more strings and harpsichords. Then there’s Desiree which is carried from start to finish by a staccato strings and a wonderfully breathy vocal, and Ivy, Ivy a ballad so brittle and gentle it feels like it could fall apart at any moment.

You can read much more about the band here. Suffice to say they made two albums; the second doesn’t feature the man who arguably the band’s musical genius – Michael Brown – though to be fair the remaining trio made a pretty good job of replacing him, before splitting up. There was a reunion album in the 70s which Bam Caruso put out in the 80s, but it is only a shadow of the work they did in their prime. Brown did actually make a pretty good post Left Banke album with a band called Montage but even this is hard to track down now.

It does seem bizarre, and a little unfair that virtually every band that put hand to plectrum in the 60s has had their work reissued and reappraised, yet one of the best of the lot exists only through dodgy downloads, YouTube snippets and swapped MP3s. So come on whoever owns the rights to the music – let everyone hear it!

If you have listened to the fab four’s new album (btw what happened to the drummer? Does Noel multi-task now?) you’ll know that one of its highlights The Turning bears more than a passing nod to Cliff’s seismic seventies disco anthem Devil Woman. And what a steal! To these ears it sounds like the best thing that Oasis have done since, ooohh, Beetlebum!

So why stop there? There are many Cliffster gems which Noel and his chums could purloin for future albums. Here’s a few suggestions… Monobrows and shell suits – now that is a cool look.

1 Power to all our friends – Cliff’s stomping paen to worldwide revolutionaries, cunningly disguised as a Eurovision song contest entry from 1973 has all the glam rock trademarks of Noel’s beloved Slade. Would have made a brilliant opener for Lightning.

2 Take me high – The title track from Cliff’s early 70s Britcom even sounds like it should be an Oasis song. The song itself is ripe for recycling given its floaty Macca style bass and soaring, lighter aloft chorus. The film is also great. In it Cliff and his gang of young hoodlums stalk Hell’s Kitchen in downtown Manhattan desperately searching for hallucinogenic drugs and do not in any way mess about on boats and in burger bars in Birmingham.

3 Move it – The best British rock and roll record ever. Better than even Shaky, Showwaddywaddy and The Rubettes. Noel should move quickly and nick that classic Hank Marvin response riff before The Kooks get their mitts on it.

4 Miseltoe and Wine – Well the last Oasis Chrimbo single (Whatever) did quite well. So it is about time for another one. Maybe Noel could think of the song as Cigarettes and Alcohol for the Saga generation.

5 Apron Strings – It isn’t just me who loves this early Cliff rocker. Sir Bob put it on his ‘Under the influence album.’ Again there’s a killer riff that’s just begging to be repurposed for Shock of the Lightning vol 2.

The brainchild of the patron saint of PopJunkie, Mike Alway, throughout the mid and late 80s El records released a dazzling array of fantastic pop records that were a wonderful stew of wit, flair, dazzling pop and gorgeous girls. PopJunkie will check out the astonishing Renaissance Glam of the Would-Be Goods (first incarnation) at a later date but until then it’s time to feast your eyes and ears on Essex’s finest contribution to the last century – Bad Dream Fancy Dress.

Alway took a couple of young likely lasses from Southend, pitched them up with The King of Luxembourg and let them fly. The result, Choirboys Gas, is one of the few truly unique albums in pop history. The whole concept can be condensed down to the opener, The Supremes, where over a Motown-esque beat the girls share their dreams of fame and fortune before descending into a barrage of caterwauling and screaming. On this form they wouldn’t even have even got to sing a second line in an X-factor audition.

Even more astonishing is title track Choirboys Gas, a kind of mini psych pop opera complete with sitars, drastic chord and tempo changes, more off beat notes and lyrics that’s laden with more innuendo than a Carry On DVD boxed set  And there’s Leigh on Sea (Y-Fronts and Antique shops), quite possibly the only ever paen to an Essex seaside town which is sugary sweet enough to make you want to decamp there for good. Best of all is the album’s bonafide pop classic, Curry Crazy, where over a belting guitar riff and Bontempi style organs our classy Essex chicks screech ‘we don’t want boys we want some spicy stuff!’

Forget death metal and banging techno, if you ever want to clear a room this is the album to play. Yet you can guarantee that there will always be one smart person in the room who’ll salute it as a work of unbridled genius. ‘One day, gentleman, they will be old bags,’ goes the visionary sleeve notes. ‘But not yet. For now the Bad Dream Fancy Dress girls are in their prime, raucous and high-pitched. How can they fail with Saturday night and Nestlé’s condensed milk?’ Indeed.

Bad Dream Fancy Dress – Choirboys Gas 1989 El Records

Now all but the privileged few will have heard the Bromley boy’s debut LP, largely because rock snobs have for decades written it off as a Anthony Newley pastiche. The fact that its preceding single, The Laughing Gnome, featured guest vocals from what sounds like Cilla Black quaffing helium didn’t help matters either.

Nevertheless, David Bowie (the album) is a place we visit regularly, mostly to play Maid of Bond Street, a genuinely tender little ditty that stays in your heads for days. The album also boasts one of his best ever singles, Love you Til Tuesday, which we adore for its juddering downward bass line, chirpy strings and genius pay off line about stretching it to Wednesday. Few other artists have tapped into the frailty of human relationships in such a sympathetic way. Rubber Band with its Salvation Army style shuffle is a wonderful evocation of Olde England – Ray Davies spends most evenings wishing he’d written it – while Bowie’s pleading vocal on Sell Me A Coat is among the most dramatic and poignant of his long career.

Sadly for Bowie, the album proved to be a one-off and within a few years he’d traded the subtle witticism of his early stuff for the fun, but rather obvious Mick Ronson powered glam rock riffs. And while he did knock out of a few good tunes later in his career, Heroes, Boys Keep Swinging and Oh You Pretty Things (Peter Noone version obviously), little compares to this album, his early Pye 45s and of course the non-album cut The London Boys. Not just a brilliant evocation of swinging Soho from 1967, but also a tune that lent its name to one of the ’80s top notch disco bands. It doesn’t get much better than that.

David Bowie – David Bowie (1967) Deram

Poor old OJ Simpson. In spite of the fact he was apparently a brilliant footballer (though I don’t recall seeing him in The Premiership) and a class actor who graced several Naked Gun movies he’ll be remembered forever as a man who escaped getting banged up for murder – even though let’s not forget a jury found him innocent.

Alas a similar fate has already befallen Claudine Longet, a beautiful French chanteuse/actress who, in a startling prequel to the OJ incident, accidentally shot and killed her long time lover Spider Sabich. Even though ex hubby Andy Williams, whose cardigans alone are the hallmarks of a man who can tell nothing but the truth, proclaimed her innocence, the fact that she ended up copping off with her lawyer and her thirty day stint in the Nick means that there are still those for whom she is off limits as far as barbecue invitations go.

All this is a dreadful shame as it means that only the dedicated few know that in the late 60s and early 70s Longet made some of the most remarkable records ever.
Sure they might all boast twee MOR cover versions, and yes the orchestral backing may at times seem so sugary they could send diabetics hyper, but all feature Ms Longet’s unrivalled unique singing style. Part whisper, part warble and laden with a heavy dose of Franglais, it’s arguably the sexiest singing voice ever committed to vinyl. As good a place to start is Claudine’s debut from 1967 imaginatively titled Claudine.

Recorded at around the same time she was starring alongside a Black and White minstrel influenced Peter Sellers in the daftest of all swinging sixties movies (and it has plenty of competition) The Party, Claudine reveals Ms Longet in all her breathy, girly, Gallic glory. In Wanderlove, a beautiful ballad complete with the usual 67 trappings of a sitar and cascading strings, it has arguably her best tune too. Though her version of Macca’s Here, There and Everywhere (dig the Pizicatto strings) and the impossibly cute My Guy (as in Mary Wells) run it close. Perhaps most memorable of all is Hello, Hello, a cover of the vaudeville turn written by San Fran soft sikers Sopwith Camel. For when Claudine asks you ‘Would you like some of my tangerine?’ you know you’ll never get a better offer again ever!

Claudine Longet – Claudine 1967 (A&M)

Most of the album will be featured on the forthcoming Revola comp Hello, Hello.

Recorded in Memphis in 1968, the imaginatively titled From Elvis in Memphis captures the Marquis doing what he did best – interpreting the music of the southern states of his birth – soul and country. A distant cousin of white soul albums like Dusty in Memphis and Bobbie Gentry’s Touch ‘em with Love, both of which incidentally were recorded in… well you know, Elvis’s album gets some lip service from the fans as it includes his biggest later day hit – the glorious In the Ghetto.

Yet energised by his recent TV special and backed by a crack team of musicians he delivers twelve songs that rank amongst the best of his rather chequered career. The opener Wearing That Loved On Look sets the template – funky backing, brilliant vocals, groovy girl backing singers. From here on in its gems all the way. He never sounded quite as mournful as Long Black Limousine or as potent as on the lock-up-your-daughters groin thrust of Power of My Love. At the other end of the spectrum there’s Gentle on my Mind, a souped version of the song made famous by Glen Campbell, that could well be the definitive take.

Fork out for the extra tracks boxed set and you also get Suspicious minds and Kentucky Women, two more of his finest singles. Buy this, the Sun Sessions and, for sheer entertainment value, the soundtrack to the movie he made with Nancy Sinatra – Speedway. You’ll then have pretty much all Elvis’s essential moments. Is that a great return for twenty years in the biz?

Elvis Presley – From Elvis in Memphis 1969 (RCA)

In years to come, the Pet Shop Boys will go down in the annals (or should that be anals?) of pop history for their camp cover versions and the dubious origins of their name, which is rumoured to involve hamsters and men’s bottoms.
If there’s any justice in the world, Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe should be remembered for making one of the greatest British pop albums of all time – 1990′s Behaviour.

Their most moody and contemplative record to date, it’s awash with ruminations on love, life and loss, all set to analogue synths, autumnal strings and Johnny Marr’s exquisite guitar work.
Part recorded in Munich with Harold ‘Axel F’ Faltermeyer on production duties, Behaviour spurns the Pet Shop Boys’ trademark sample-based studio trickery for a warmer, more organic, yet downbeat, sound – Cole Porter does deep house.

At the time of its release, Behaviour was criticised for being old fashioned and out of touch with contemporary club culture. Ironically, 15 years later, it still sounds fresh and vibrant, unlike all of those dodgy old rave white labels that were soooo cool at the time.
It’s also a desperately sad record, kicking off with the Stock, Aitken and Waterman influenced Being Boring, in which Tennant recounts growing up with a close friend who’s recently died, and ending with the heavenly choirs and harps of Jealousy, the best show tune that never was.
In-between these two benchmark songs, we are transported back to Tennant’s school days for the haunting This Must Be The Place I Waited Years To Leave, cringe as the Pet Shop Boys flirt with swing-beat on the celebrity-baiting How Can You Expect To Be Taken Seriously? and smile wryly at My October Symphony, which is basically Shostakovitch with house piano.

As if that’s not enough, we also get a blast of Donna Summer disco (So Hard), Depeche Mode’s Enjoy The Silence meets Kylie (The End of The World) and a theatrical gay ballad (Nervously). What more could you want?
Robbie Williams loves this album – he once sang the whole of Only The Wind to Neil Tennant in the Groucho Club upstairs bar. How showbiz is that? Just listen to Robbie’s No Regrets – it’s practically a Behaviour outtake.
The Pet Shop Boys have never bettered Behaviour. They tried to recapture its mood with 2002′s Release, but failed to even get close.
Easily as good as The Smiths’ The Queen Is Dead, Behaviour is everything a pop masterpiece should be – witty, elegant, sad, overblown and effortlessly hummable.
Absolutely fabulous, darling.

Pet Shop Boys – Behaviour 1990 (EMI)

Once touted as ‘The new Smiths’, Gene never fulfilled their true potential. Winners of the NME’s Best New Act in 1995, Martin Rossiter’s Britrock four-piece were soon quickly consigned to the indie bargain bin, despite the fact that they continued to make great records and perform sell-out shows up until their demise last year. Constant comparisons to The Smiths did Gene more harm than good, with critics lambasting Rossiter for his Morrissey like stage persona and vocal style.

If anything, the Gene singer’s stylish suits, camp mannerisms and razor-sharp wit were a welcome antidote to the hairy-arsed, beer-fuelled antics of the Gallagher brothers and their ilk – and the music was miles better than most of the other acts in Britpop’s second division. Northern Uproar, anyone? Gene’s 1995 debut album, Olympian, had several moments of brilliance, including the stately title track, but it was largely a patchy affair, which failed to capture the incendiary power of the band’s live shows.

It wasn’t until 1997′s epic Drawn To The Deep End that Gene truly showed what they were capable of, fleshing out their sound with lap steel, mellotron, strings and brass. Teaming up with producer Chris Hughes, formerly of Adam and The Ants, Rossiter and co created a moody, sophisticated, lavish indie rock masterpiece that was largely ignored at the time of its release, overshadowed by Cool Britannia and champagne parties at Number 10. While everyone else was having a knees up with Blair, Gene were being fey and miserable and writing songs about suicide attempts, sexual fervour, unrequited love and coming out. Supergrass they were not! Indeed, at the time of the record’s release, Rossiter made it public that he’d been suffering from severe depression.

From the opening track, the frankly astonishing New Amusements, it’s clear that Gene mean business. Beginning with a burst of feedback, a deathly drum track and spine-tingling piano, the song then literally explodes out of the speakers with a ferocity not heard since the title track of, er, The Smiths’ The Queen Is Dead. As guitarist Steve Mason lets loose a mutated rockabilly riff, Rossiter groans like some sort of pervy old git and then starts declaring, "I can bring you solace on the bureau in my office," before the whole thing turns into an unholy mix of The Rolling Stones and Depeche Mode. The overall effect is stunning and utterly unnerving.

From then on in, Drawn To The Deep End never fails to surprise the listener, veering from Northern Soul (Fighting Fit), into R.E.M territory – Speak To Me Someone is Everybody Hurts performed by Vegas-era Elvis – and then mournful country rock (Why I Was Born and We Could Be Kings). There’s even a waltz (Long Sleeves For The Summer), a funereal murder ballad (The Accidental), Queen-style flamboyance (I Love You, What Are You?) and a delicate lullaby that segues into a massive rock finale with an orchestral blowout (Sub Rosa). When Gene toured Drawn To The Deep End, they ended their string of dates with a concert at The Royal Albert Hall. It was the perfect venue to hear such a grand gesture of an album.

Gene – Drawn To The Deep End 1997 (Polydor)

Stop me if you think you’ve heard this one before, but Morrissey hasn’t always been regarded as one of England’s national treasures.
Back in the early ’90s, he was hated by the music press. The post-Smiths backlash started when Mozzer released his ‘difficult’ second album, Kill Uncle, and spiralled out of control when he flirted with right wing imagery for the follow-up, Your Arsenal.
OK, so we admit that waving a Union Jack around is a bit dodgy, but how can you criticise Mozzer for making Kill Uncle – one of his most enjoyable and diverse records. Funny, sad, moving and controversial, it’s everything a Morrissey album should be.

The closing sombre ballad, There’s A Place In Hell For Me and My Friends, could well be Stephen Patrick’s finest solo moment. Backed by a piano arrangement that’s worthy of any state funeral, Mozzer ponders the afterlife. Honestly, when the drums kick in, it’ll make your quiff wilt.
Clocking in at a paltry 33 minutes, Kill Uncle is Morrissey’s shortest album. On its release in 1991, it was accused of being lightweight, but compared to some of Mozzer’s later efforts (the experimental Southpaw Grammar and the patchy Maladjusted), it’s a delicious, quirky pop treat.

Produced by Clive Langer and Alan Winstanley (Madness and Elvis Costello) – Morrissey had severed his alliance with Stephen Street – it includes rockabilly (Sing Your Life), raga-violin (Asian Rut and Our Frank), Roxy Music keyboards (Mute Witness) and strange music hall accompaniment (The Harsh Truth Of The Camera Eye).
It’s not just the music that’s wildly eclectic – Morrissey also creates a weird and wonderful array of characters including a deaf and dumb thalidomide victim and ‘a tooled up Asian boy’ who’s out to avenge the murder of his best friend. Corrie scripwriters take note.

One of the highlights, the guitar-heavy rocker, Found, Found, Found is rumoured to be about Mozzer’s friendship with Michael Stipe.
For Kill Uncle, Morrissey teamed up with two new songwriting partners – Clive Langer and Fairground Attraction’s Mark E Nevin. The end result was a varied album that never failed to surprise – a long-lost Mozzer classic.
Cherish it like your favourite, er, uncle.

Morrissey – Kill Uncle 1991 (EMI)

Soulful voiced Cathy shot to fame in the early ’90s. Discovered by music mogul Simon Fuller, who was then managing Dancin’ Danny D and his club act, D-Mob, she recorded a string of lightweight dance tunes and fluffy pop ballads. Her big break came when she sang on D-Mob’s massive club hit C’mon and Get My Love.

Cathy released her first solo album, Move To This, in 1990, following it with 1992′s Into The Skyline, recorded with the ludicrously named dance producer Shep Pettibone.
All of a sudden Cathy got bored of her dodgy acid pop roots and decided she preferred Ray Davies to Dancin’ Danny D-Mob and co. And who can blame her?

Released in 1996, Am I The Kinda Girl? saw Cathy embracing classic Sixties pop culture. Inspired by her love of The Beatles, Paul Weller and The Kinks, she hooked up with producer Mark Saunders, songwriters Guy Chambers and Andy Partridge (XTC) and the aforementioned Mr Davies to create the perfect fusion of Sixties sounds and Nineties rock.
What’s more, she even had the cheek to throw in a fantastic cover version of Waterloo Sunset, which equals the original (no, really).

Jumping on the Britpop bandwagon may have won Cathy some cool points, but unfortunately the album tanked and didn’t even get an American release. It did, however, provide her with her second most successful single in terms of chart placing since 1991′s Touch Me (All Night Long) – Cathy’s version of Waterloo Sunset made no 11 in the UK.
Talking of touching all night long, blokes are advised to check out the cover of Am I The Kinda Girl?

It features Cathy as a saucy Britpop babe, clad in Carnaby Street finery and looking fitter than a butcher’s dog!
Opening track West End Pad kicks the album off in style. It’s a classy, infectious pop tune that is best heard blaring from a car radio in the King’s Road. Better still is Don’t Take My Heaven. With its Bacharach brass, easy listening harmonies and boutique chic, it’s the best song St Etienne never wrote.
On Fickle, Cathy clambers into a spare pair of Madness’ baggy trousers for a ska-tinged knees-up, and on the summer stroll That Is Why You Love Me she admits her weakness for Michael Caine and sings about retro Adidas trainers – Damon Albarn eat your heart out.

The title track, co-written by Andy Partridge, is just plain bizarre. Cathy goes all lipstick lesbo on our ass ("Am I the kinda girl who could be your boyfriend?") over a robotic rock guitar riff – fantastic!
Homing The Rocket (sounds like a wanking euphemism to us) is equally as cool, all strange vocal effects and space age noises, Cathy giving the brush off to a boring bloke: "I can get more kicks from a Mexican dish than I’m ever gonna get from hangin’ around with you." Miaow!
If you’re after a more melancholy vibe, then try the beautiful, dusky country ballads When Dreams Turn To Dust and Crazy Ones or the sublime acoustic pop of The Date, co-written by Ray Davies.

When it came out, Am I The Kinda Girl? was commercial suicide for Cathy, so much so that she gave up performing and turned to writing pop tunes for other artists.
Now, almost ten years later, it deserves to be hailed as a Britpop classic – Nineties London meets the swingin’ Sixties. Not a lot of people know that.

Cathy Dennis – Am I that kind of girl?  1997 (Polydor)