From the moment he first appeared as frontman of psychedelic post-punk outfit The Soft Boys in the mid-'70s, England's Robyn Hitchcock was a celebrated international cult musical figure. Son of a famous author, and a diehard lifelong Dylan fan—he released an album of Dylan covers in 2002—Hitchcock himself took more of a traveling troubadour approach to his music following the initial demise of The Soft Boys in 1980 (the original outfit has briefly reformed several times since then). In a wildly varied music career, Hitchcock has released several acoustic records, starting with 1984's I Often Dream of Trains, and also fronted a couple of longstanding bands, most significantly alt-rockers The Egyptians, with whom he enjoyed his greatest commercial success in the late '80s. The one constant throughout all his work has been Hitchcock's whimsical and surreal lyrical outlook. He remains as active and creatively vibrant as he was back in the mid-'70s.