�Band mates have reunited after 35 years apart to record a tribute single to their former drummer who found fame in America before being killed in 2005.

Ilford rock group Good Thinking toured some of east London’s hottest venues in the mid 1970s before disbanding.

For the next three-and-a-half decades, the five men went their separate ways, living their lives across east London and Essex.

It was only last year, via a profile posting on website Friends Reunited, that the men got back in touch with each other.

But their reunion was marked with a tragic revelation, as they learned what had happened to drummer Mark Evans.

He had gone to America in search of a career in music in the 1980s.

It was when he was in New York that he joined rock group Warrior Soul, playing on three of their albums in the 1990s.

The 48-year-old eventually returned to the UK and lived in Coulson Close, Chadwell Heath, but was murdered in a brutal attack in January 2005.

Now his former band mates have recorded a single in his honour titled Warrior Soul.

Singer and guitarist Marc Ring, who penned the tribute song, said: “It was difficult writing a song about someone who we haven’t had much contact with for a long, long time, but what we tried to do was to pay our respects to a guy who made it in the music business.

“He made it to the top of his chosen profession and he was very successful.”

The 55-year-old of Chelmsford, who used to go to Ilford County High School, added: “Mark was such a brilliant musician.

“We were 18, 19, 20-year-olds all still trying to learn our instruments and trying to be better, but Mark was fantastic at 18. He was naturally gifted.”

Noel Buckley, Good Thinking’s “chief roadie” and now a rock photographer of Ilford, said an album of new and old tracks was now in the pipeline for the band.

Warrior Soul, a soft ballad, will be available to download from iTunes from Monday.