STUDENTS and staff at Forth Valley College were so proud of lecturer Des McCabe and his hit song, they made their own music video tribute.

Des and his Dead Man Fall band mates hit the top of the US charts after their song ‘Bang Your Drum’ was covered by Scottish TV presenter Craig Ferguson on his last ever The Late, Late Show in America before Christmas.

More than 50 A-list stars such as Matthew McConaughey, Samuel L Jackson, Quentin Tarantino, Kevin Bacon, Lisa Kudrow, Larry King and Mila Kunis took part in a drum banging video cover on the show and now a similar number of staff and students at the college – with campuses in Alloa, Falkirk and Stirling – have produced their own version.

Craig, who is originally from Cumbernauld, had initially asked the band to perform their version of the song on the show in October after one of the musicians tweeted him with a link to their video.

However after the unsigned band were unable to secure visas, the producer of the show contacted them to ask if they could still use the song but do a video cover for the opening segment of Ferguson’s last show.

Welding lecturer Des, who has been with the college for 12 years, said: “It is great to see the song being used by the students and staff to show what is happening at the college.

“We never imagined this would all happen. We were excited and shocked when we were first asked to perform on the show and even more so when the producer told us about the idea for the video cover.

“We felt total disbelief even before we knew exactly which stars were going to be involved.

“The whole experience has been totally overwhelming and we all feel very humbled. We’re so thankful to all the people involved in making it happen.” The song reached No.1 in the US iTunes rock chart, No.1 in the Amazon Bestsellers Chart and No.24 in the UK iTunes rock chart and the response has been overwhelming with the catchy song, and both the Late, Late, Show and Dead Man Fall’s own videos of the hit, grabbing the attention of the public.

The future is now looking bright for the band who formed in 2012 after having known each other since school.

Forth Valley College principal, Dr Ken Thomson, said: “We are all so proud of Des and what he has achieved with his band Dead Man Fall and it was a very nice gesture for him to allow us to use the song for our own film.

“The song is very positive, uplifting and inspirational and we like to think that Forth Valley College also promotes these values and encourages our students to bang their drum to a creative and academic beat, to help them on the road to their ideal career.” The college film can be seen at http://youtu.be/caT3H-uYr60 and on the FVC website news pages.