The latest volume of Alexei Sayle’s autobiography, following Stalin Ate My Homework, takes us through the most exciting – and contrasting – years of his life. At the start he is a penniless student, at the end he is hanging out with Sting and wrestling with his politically charged conscience about success and money.

Along the way we get the story of the origins of the alternative comedy movement from someone who wasn’t just there but really was at the epicentre. Sayle was the very first person onstage at the Comedy Store’s first night in May 1979. He makes the claim in the book that he set the template for this revolutionary non-sexist, non-racist form of comedy and it is hard to argue with him. 

Of course, like most revolutions things didn’t go quite to plan. He thought he was part of a group of comics including Rik Mayall and Ade Edmondson who were against the Oxbridge brigade as well as the old school “patter merchants”. So he was shocked when Fry, Laurie and Thompson appeared in The Young Ones’ famous ‘Bambi’ episode. But it turned out that this skinhead in a tight suit with a Marxist-Leninist background was the only one of the group who had issues with them. He suggests that everybody else thought they were lovely.

Not surprisingly Sayle writes very well. His style is fluid if less punchy than his early stand-up. He does have a bit of an obsession with the British manufacturing industry (peeling off labels on British goods to see where they were really made) as well as an interest in bikes, cars and guns – as a child he used to play with a gun made out of bread, which was fine as long as it didn’t rain.

Along with some vivid on-the-road anecdotes and affectionate portraits of his eccentric mother Molly, his ever-supportive wife Linda and the intriguingly complex Rik Mayall (he is not quite as kind about serial loose cannon Keith Allen), the underlying theme of his book is the question of sticking to one’s beliefs. While Sayle probably quite fancied being rich and famous he also didn’t want to “sell out”. At one point he writes that his Communist upbringing helped him to stay true to his beliefs. I guess that’s how Stalin stayed so nice and grounded too. 

This meant that while contemporaries ended up hanging out at celebrity parties he kept his old friends from his Liverpool days - even though they were bitter about not being successful and he had to cycle long distances across London to meet them. He says getting a taxi would have been too flash. He doesn’t seem to consider using public transport.

The story ends with Sayle riding high in the 1980s, leaving plenty of scope for at least one more volume. Tony Blair Ate My Panini? 

Buy here.