A BOURNEMOUTH man has revealed his story of stumbling across one of the UK's biggest bands at Bournemouth beach.

Southbourne resident Simon Miles recalled the moment in 1997 when, aged 12, he was on holiday at the beach and discovered Liam and Noel Gallagher taking the photo for the single cover to All Around the World.

The single went on to hit number one in the UK singles charts at the time and the band has hit headlines again after announcing a number of huge stadium gigs across the UK and Ireland.

Simon said: "One morning we woke up and there was this huge fire service cherry picker sitting above the cliff.

"We would have gone down to the bistro on the beach for breakfast and, obviously, as a twelve-year-old with two younger brothers, all three of us were excited to see a fire engine."

Simon explained that on arrival there seemed to be little explanation why it was there after rushing to see the fire engine.

Despite originally believing he may have stumbled across the fire service saving people's lives, he only saw two men stood on the beach.

He said: "They certainly weren't in a hurry so we assumed they weren't rescuing anyone. No one was falling down a cliff or anything like that.

"It just turned out there was a guy sat at the top [of the cherry picker] taking photos of two people wandering about the beach with just a little writing in the sand.

"We would have just gone on our way."

It wasn't until the single was released in January 1998 Simon and his family realised what they had seen.

Simon's dad had seen a poster in a store window coming home from work and immediately recognised it.  Simon said: "My dad came home and he saw a poster in the Virgin megastore window. We went to school the next day and told all our friends.

"They were looking at us thinking, 'no, this is some exotic location'."

Since then, the photo has been confirmed to have been taken on Southbourne beach outside what is now Sobo Beach.

Asked why Simon decided to move to Southbourne, he expressed that although it was a 'bit of a chance', he loves it as it 'feels like holiday all year round.'