“What is Hip?” is a song written by Tower of Power, a horn line that recorded a few of their own pieces in the 80’s. This is NC State’s pep band playing it during the spring semester of 2020. This was the first band NC State had that was allowed to meet in person since COVID sent everyone home a full year previously. As such, the band set out to record many of their normal pieces played during the basketball season.
In this particular recording, three bands were recorded, and the students voted (blindly) on which band to select. The sound from that chosen recording was then put over the videos of the three bands playing it. The audio was recorded with a few boom mics placed across the auditorium, to capture the resonance and familiar sound of NC State’s pep band.