'Glee' covers A Great Big World's 'This Is the New Year': Indie duo reacts

"It's a new year, and a new me," sang Chord Overstreet during "Glee's" rousing, episode-closing number, "This Is the New Year," Thursday night.

And perhaps a new direction for New Directions?

In both of its new episodes this year, "Glee" prominently featured an indie artist (though last week's "Baby Got Back" cover of a cover incited a huge controversy … more on that later). This week, it highlighted indie duo A Great Big World.

"Glee" has covered a few indie songs in the past, like Fun.'s "We Are Young" and Gotye's "Somebody That I Used to Know." But might the show move toward unearthing hidden musical gems this year? Let's hope!

When we spoke to A Great Big World's Ian Axel and Chad Vaccarino yesterday, they were thrilled and excited about their song being showcased on the popular series.

"When we wrote the song, 'This Is the New Year,' years ago, it was our dream to get the song on 'Glee,'" Axel said. "And we would always joke about it, like, 'How are we going to do this?'"

It turned out to be just one of those things. A Fox executive liked the song, and last month it was sent to "Glee's" music supervisor, who passed it on to showrunner Ryan Murphy.

"The rest happened super-fast," Axel marveled.

"It was kind of like an alignment of stars," Vaccarino said.

Axel added, "The right timing. The right episode. The right people."

The response from "Glee" fans has been very warm, they noted. And the show's cover of their song is certainly causing much less controversy than last week's indie-related number.

The controversy began when singer Jonathan Coulton noted that their "Baby Got Back" cover sounded exactly his own from years before. His fans expressed outrage that "Glee" didn't credit him for inspiration, at the least.

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Axel said he was aware of the altercation but didn't know enough to comment on it.

For A Great Big World, this "Glee" project was entirely positive. "We're feeling a lot of love from 'Glee' and the 'Glee' family," Vaccarino gushed. "Ryan Murphy himself tweeted about it."

Right now, the duo is working on more songs and putting together a tour. And they're prepared if "Glee" helps launch them to another level.

Said Axel, "This is what we wanted, and we're ready for it."

"Glee" airs Thursdays at 9 PM on Fox.