A few months ago, the Washington, DC-based band Bacchae released a new self-titled EP. It’s a nervy and energetic blast of pastel punk music, and today its opening track “Dig” is getting a music video. It takes the form of an old-school dating video tape, as band members and friends get spotlighted with assistance from fuzzy VHS aesthetics as they show off their different personalities. The song it’s attached to is a frenzied fever dream: “Use me up! Tear me down!,” the band sings. “Will it heal me, will it kill me? Will it fulfill me or destroy me?/ I guess it’s over now.”

Here’s how the band frames the song and video:

Online or offline, dating often carries an atmosphere of antagonism: How do you win them over? How do you convince someone to love you? If you pay for dinner, will they put out? Capitalism causes us to view our relationships in transactional terms, warping and corroding our experience of romance. We’re taught to think about dating in terms of commerce: We create profiles with lists of our selling points, think of our biggest deal-breakers and hide our flaws so potential partners don’t realize we’re poor investments.

“Dig” is a song about the desperation of convincing an old lover to take you back, but it is also about how the commodification of romance makes us feel alienated from one another. We used the style of pre-online video dating services to communicate this feeling, and because it was a great excuse to make our friends wear silly clothes. We produced, filmed and edited the video ourselves, and with the help of our friends.

Watch below.

The Bacchae EP is out now via Get Better Records. Order it here.