IU Anthem stars release new video ‘This Is Indiana’

“IU Anthem” stars seniors Brice Fox and Daniel Weber want to be more than frat bros that can sing or white boys that can’t dance. And they definitely want to be more than a pair of mustaches and an anthem.

They’ve made a career out of what Indiana is all about. And Indiana is where it all started.

They’re releasing a new song today, ‘This Is Indiana,’about IU basketball.
During the fall of 2009, Fox and Weber met behind the scenes of sorority Zeta Tau Alpha’s philanthropy, Big Man On Campus.

Now, the two Hoosier seniors are a long way from the tunes that started both their music careers in high school. Fox, who started tapping rhythms to make fun of his friends, now produces all the duo’s beats.

“Then, after I got over my vocal insecurities, I finally got serious about it,” Fox said.
Weber started belting out notes in music class his senior year in high school.

“I have to admit it,” Weber laughed. “I was the dorky choir kid.”

Once at IU, they became inspired by the people around them. Neither enrolled in the Jacobs School of Music, but each took a music course — an introduction to voice class for Fox and History of the Beatles for Weber. “If that counts,” Weber said.

“It really helped tune my rap skills,” Fox said of his voice class with a jesting tone. “But seriously I’ve never had any vocal training.”

“I think rap skills are secondary,” Weber added. “We’re both primarily musicians and singers, and the rapping is kind of a fun thing to do.”

Since Big Man On Campus, they’ve rapped it out and laid down the beats.

“One banner. Two banner. Three banner. Four. Five banner. Six banner knockin’ on your door.”

After a 60,000-plus hit video, “IU Anthem,”  brought them fame on YouTube, at Kilroy’s and across campus parties, Fox and Weber decided to give an IU-themed song another shot. This time, they said, they wanted it to reach a wider audience. In order to do that, their video had to be more “family-friendly.”

So, they lost the mustaches and the costumes, got permission from the Athletics Department and teamed up with senior Danny Olson to produce “This is Indiana,” complete with a Cook Hall party and Coach Knight flashbacks. The song was released on YouTube and iTunes today.

Fox, a Bloomington native, and Weber, a Chicago suburb native, spent two months writing, recording and producing. The song portrays the relaxed personalities and humorous outlook of its two stars. However, the thread that ties the net together is the legacy and tradition of Indiana basketball.

“We decided with our next song if we wanted to go big, we had to do Indiana basketball,” Fox said. “Even though our team’s not as good as it’s been in the past, it’s definitely getting better than it has been in the last two years. We just want to get everyone excited about it again.”

They want everyone to get excited for those candy-striped pants, to sit on the edge of the seat, whether a child or a grandparent. The song’s music video, also released today, portrays the fandom of Hoosiers across the generations.

“My favorite part of making this whole video was tying the different generations of Hoosier fans together,” Fox said. “It was definitely a lot of fun to help direct like the little kids and the old ladies. They had a little coffee table to stand on and go nuts. The TV wasn’t on, but I stood there and was like, ‘He’s dribbling down the court. He breaks to the right side. He releases the ball. It’s a last second shot. And ... IT GOES IN!’ All the kids just started going crazy. It was just the funniest thing ever. It was the exact same thing with the older ladies, only they weren’t able to jump up on the coffee table, but they still got crazy.”

“This is I-U-U-U. We got banners on the wall. This is how we ball.”

“This is Indiana” covers it all, including the hype of new recruits.

“This just in. Got a top recruit committed while you rottin’ like PU.”

“Conveniently we’ve landed a lot of amazing recruits recently, and we put a part in the song talking about recruits just to kind of be a slap in the face to the other Big Ten schools that missed out on Zeller and Ferrell,” Fox said.

And they couldn’t forget to mention the current leader of Indiana basketball, coach Tom Crean, and the hopes of a return to glory.

“I love Tom Crean, and I like what he’s doing with the program,” Weber said. “In the video, you can see that we have a clip of Tom Crean, and we say ‘Follow Tom Crean,’ and we flash over to Bobby Knight and say ‘He gon’ take us back to greatness.’ It’s kind of implying that Tom Crean has the potential to be the next Bobby Knight or the potential to be the next great IU coach.”

The music video is even complete with a rendition of one of Knight’s most famous scenes at Indiana.

“We didn’t want to mess up the court,” Weber laughed about the shot that was filmed in the hallway of Assembly Hall. “I think through IU Athletics, they don’t necessarily want to bring that up, but to all of the fans that know Bobby Knight, we couldn’t let Bobby Knight go. He was such a big part of the school and brought us so many championships that we had to incorporate some sort of Bobby Knight in there and what better way to do that then by having a Hoosier-looking girl throw a chair?”

Now “the IU anthem guys” have a song about Indiana’s hopes of returning to basketball greatness. Fox and Weber know that although the clock may be running out on their collegiate careers, Crean’s coaching could turn back the clock to IU’s winning ways.

“We might be struggling this year so far, but we have a bright future ahead of us,” Fox said. “But, I think this song could be used in reference throughout our near future.”