A legendary 1980s band which inspired a creative, front page headline in the News & Star said they found the pun "very funny".

The headline “Orchestral removers in the dark”, which featured on the front page of Saturday’s edition, highlighted a burglary at Omega Music in Brampton where £40,000 of specialist instruments were stolen.

It was written by sub-editor Anthony Ferguson who was inspired by the band Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark.

Coincidentally, the day the paper hit the stands the band were travelling through the county on their way to a gig in Glasgow. Singer Andy McCluskey posed for a picture with the front page, which was then posted on the band’s official Twitter account.

Pictures of the front page have been shared and liked over 25,000 times on Twitter and Facebook and celebrities such as Jeremy Vine have sung its praise.

Founder member of the band Paul Humphrey said: “Our drummer Stuart actually spotted someone post it on Twitter.

"We were on our way through Cumbria so we stopped off and Andy picked up a copy. It’s a very funny headline, shame about the robbery though. Hope they get their instruments back.”

Stuart added: “When we stopped in Cumbria Andy said: ‘You have got to take a picture of this.’”

Omega owner Ian Warnes was impressed and as a fan of OMD, who used to play their material in a band, he said it can only help with the police appeal which has now reached so many more people.

“It just gets a lot of exposure. If anybody is offered an instrument they will know. It couldn’t have been better really,” he said.

N ews &Star associate editor Chris Story said it was nice for great headline writing to be recognised, and for Andy McCluskey to go out of his way to get his hands on a copy.

He added: “Of course, there’s a serious message behind this story – that’s to help police track down the thieves who struck at Omega Music in Brampton. Hopefully this exposure will help bring those responsible to justice.”

The haul of high quality instruments were stolen from the shop, based in Townfoot Industrial Estate, on Tuesday.

Suspects cut a hole in the roof of an attic warehouse and used a double base case to clear the shelves of saxophones, clarinets, flutes trumpets and French horns.

In total more than 230 instruments were taken.

It’s thought they were transferred from the roof of the building to a van parked on Carlisle Road.

Staff at Omega believe the shop has been targeted in a planned, professional job where the site has been checked out beforehand and the offenders had known what they wanted to take. The alarm was not set off during the incident.

Police are continuing to investigate. Anyone with information is asked to contact 101 quoting log 49 of November 15.