“And you know I’m scared / Like a third grader on a triple dog dare,” Alex Luciano sings on Diet Cig’s latest rebellion-pop song “Dinner Date.” Luciano has a way of rendering her pithy, simply-stated fears and failures into a kind of grumbling that feels more like defiance than self-pity, and Noah Bowman’s rubbery bass line keeps the New Paltz duo driving into punk territory. It’s one of the things that makes Diet Cig so easy to like; they’re just as scared and confused as the rest of us, but they’re plowing ahead anyway. “Dinner Date” continues their tradition of converting all that angst and loss into a sprawling indie pop mini-epic. It will be on their new 7″ that comes out this September, along with “Sleep Talk.” Listen and watch the animated clip below, done by Laurent Hrybyk.

The “Sleep Talk” b/w “Dinner Date” 7″ is out 9/18 via Father/Daughter Records in the US and Art Is Hard in the UK.