To some, the Captain’s 1982 No 1 romp through Rodgers and Hammerstein’s “Happy Talk” was the ultimate punk sell-out. Silly beggars! It was, of course, a hilarious act of screwball subversion.
Either way, its Goonish novelty was unrepresentative of the two albums that followed. As the best bits collated here show, solo Sensible traded in the same satirical Englishness as The Kinks and Madness (“Croydon”, “A Nice Cup Of Tea”). His lovable “Rapper’s Delight” pastiche “Wot” still raises a smile, but did 1984’s touching “There’s More Snakes Than Ladders” really only reach No 57? He was robbed.
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