Glasgow punks Gallus hook up with Scotland squad to unveil Proclaimers World Cup cover

The song is out now on Marshall Records, the record label from the iconic live music amplification brand, who created a one-off custom Scotland speaker for the team to take to the USA.

The band – Barry Dolan, Paul and Eamon Ewin, Gianluca Bernacchi and Matt McGoldrick – are big football fans so were thrilled to be invited to watch the squad train and blast out their World Cup anthem.

Eamon said: “Ben Gannon-Doak and Billy Gilmour were great - very down to earth for a guy who's won the Champions League and a Premier League star.

“Steve Clarke was also very generous with his time, especially considering he'd just announced his new contract.

“They liked the song, but they seemed especially blown away by how loud the speaker was.

“Meeting the team was amazing but just watching the training was really exciting. You get a real sense of the players’ quality seeing them up close like that.”

The raucous punk take on the classic song was first performed at the band’s McChuills show last month, racking up 85,000 views after the video was posted online and sparking a fan campaign for release.

The band hope Scotland fans will embrace the song during the tournament at home and abroad - but they insist the most important thing is the country uniting behind the team.

Eamon said: “That's the beauty of football and especially the World Cup, bringing people together.

“There's lots of sensationalist negative stuff around football fandom but I don't know anything that's able to unite our species like games of football.

“Anyone who has ever had access to a ball and two goalposts of some kind has been able to enjoy football.

“It's a global language and the tournament is capable of bringing joy to billions of people.

“It's so special to finally see Scotland part of it on the world stage.

“Hopefully we win the hearts of people watching - but it would be nice to maybe win a game or two this time as well.”

Marshall Records marks 10 years this year and was created to champion emerging talent, support grass roots music and work for artists.

Gallus are a long term key artist for Marshall so the label wanted to do something special to mark Scotland returning to the World Cup.

While the cover is a radically different take on the song, the band wanted to keep the spirit of the original’s message.

“We wanted to really honour the original because its message is so powerful, so we didn't touch the lyrical content or meaning when adapting it.

“But it feels really nice to have given such an iconic song our own spin and made it really feel like a Gallus song while maintaining such an important meaning

“We wanted to put our spin on it as people interpret it sentimentally but it’s not a sentimental song. It’s got a lot of emotion in it.”

Barry said: “The Proclaimers have some of the most beautiful songs and it just makes you so proud to be Scottish. This song is for everyone in Scotland.

“Letter From America is about rooting for the wee guys. That’s what we’re going to do this World Cup campaign – and that’s what we should do as a society anyway.”

Video of the band with Scotland squad: here.