Neil Innes, the British humorist and musician who was an honorary member of the Monty Python comedy troupe and made a name for himself with a nutty assortment of musical and television projects, including the Beatles parody band the Rutles, died on Sunday near Toulouse, France, where he had lived in recent years. He was 75.

His wife, Yvonne Innes, said the cause was a heart attack.

Mr. Innes, a multi-instrumentalist, was a particular type of songwriter: one who excelled at satirical songs and parodies of other people’s music, but who could also write a pretty good straight song. Sometimes it was hard to tell the difference.

In the early 1960s he was one of the first members of the Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band, also known as simply the Bonzo Dog Band. He wrote the group’s biggest hit, “I’m the Urban Spaceman,” which climbed into the Top 10 on the British charts in 1968.