The Kinks kicked off their golden age with the heavily satirical hit sigle Sunny Afternoon in England’s celebrated World Cup winning year of 1966.

Ray Davies is 82 today and with the mercury about to hit 30 degrees – or 86 alas they would have said in 1944 – it didn’t take me long to decide what song to play.

It’s the one that kicked off The Kinks’ golden age in 1966 – the start of a fertile five-year period of success for the band.

When I heard it as a child, I’m sure I heard it as a simple ode to the pleasures of lazing on a sunny afternoon. And it is. But I missed the satirical point of the song – because I was eight years old.

The narrator is a wealthy aristocrat bemoaning the loss of his unearned wealth to the progressive taxation policies of Harold Wilson’s government (see also: Taxman by The Beatles).

Drinking alone in his stately home, he can’t sell his yacht and his girlfriend has left him, “tellin’ tales of drunkenness and cruelty” (I didn’t catch the subtext as a small boy).

There’s an old-fashioned music hall feel to the melody, in contrast to the hard rocking tunes like You Really Got Me and All Day And All Of The Night with which they first made their name.

Happy birthday Ray!