A SONG recorded by James Bond star Daniel Craig when he was in school 24 years ago has been re-discovered in a Wirral recording studio.

The cover version of The Animals' 1964 hit House Of The Rising Sun features Hilbre School pupil Daniel, then aged 15, and classmates who had formed a band called Inner Voices in 1983.

They were about to enter a national competition run by the Trustees Savings Bank and the school agreed to let them go into a professional studio in Oxton to record their chosen song.

It was produced and financed by fellow pupil Alan Fennah. At the end of the session each member of the band took home a cassette and Alan was presented with the master tape that he duly filed away.

The group didn't win the competition and on leaving school went their separate ways. As for the master tape, it went missing and was never seen again. That is, until a few weeks ago.

Alan and older brother Rob, musicians and owners of Pulse Records and Productions Ltd in Birkenhead, had borrowed an old reel-to-reel tape recorder to review some of their early demo recordings. Three hours into the session Alan pressed the 'play' button and blasting from the speakers was Daniel and House of the Rising Sun. All those years ago Alan had put the tape in the wrong box.

advertisementBrother Rob, who has since sent the master tape off to Daniel together with a cover letter giving the 007 star full production rights, told the Globe: "Since the tape was discovered we've had three national papers offering us thousands of pounds for it. It was very tempting, and we could have easily used the track as a download on our website for £1 each, but after the original 'wow' factor on finding the tape we realised that it wouldn't be right to exploit Daniel like that.

"I would imagine that Bond fans would be very interested in this recording, but I certainly think it would be unfair to cash in on something that we did 24 years ago, just because Daniel's the new James Bond."

The group also featured Adam Brierley on keyboards, Paul Donnelly on drums, Alan's brother Andy on rhythm guitar and lead guitarist Paul King.

Looking back to the day that it was recorded Alan recalled: "The four-minute song took all day to record. Daniel was the quietest member of the band, but he really came alive when he started singing. The band had never played in a studio before, but they did a very good job."

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