FIFE band Gentlemen Jackals are tackling the tough subject of school shootings with the release of their latest single.

The four-piece were preparing to shoot a video for Preacher's Son, written after the Las Vegas shootings in 2017, when the pandemic struck.

As a result, they teamed up with award-winning animator Holly Summerson to bring the titular character of their latest song to life.

“Whenever we write songs together, the music always comes first,” the band's Mark Wilson says.

“I let the mood of the music inform the subject matter. In this particular instance, the sound we created called for a visceral subject matter.

“The 2017 Las Vegas shooting had just occurred and it set wheels spinning in my mind. I was thinking critically about the very real threat of gun violence for people living in the United States, and how prevalent these kinds of incidents are.”

“Religion and violence are old bedfellows,” Wilson continues. “The Old Testament is full of gruesome and violent images.

"I could see a link between fundamentalism and mass shootings, so I started to pull on that thread as I pieced together the story of the Preacher’s Son.”

The song is told from the shooter's point-of-view, the lyrics warping images traditionally seen as symbols of peace.

Wilson hopes to draw parallels between the Preacher’s Son character and American mass shooters who have conservative, elitist beliefs that they disguise as "freedoms".

The band initially planned to record a performance-style music video, but lockdown left them unable to do so.

Drummer Cameron Berwick adds: “When it became clear that we wouldn’t be able to leave our homes to film a music video for Preacher’s Son, we realised that we had two options: give up and release the track as is, or start thinking of a different way to promote the song.

“We reached out to Holly, whose work we’d discovered on Instagram. As we started to chat to her about the meaning behind the song, the ideas began to flow.”

Preacher’s Son will be officially released on Friday 1st October – exclusively on Spotify – with the animated music video landing on the group’s Facebook page on Monday, October 11.