Synopsis

Shot with a deliberately degraded VHS look, "Hard Up" alternates between a woman wandering through a sunlit coastal setting and Mi Ami performing inside a crowded house-party atmosphere. The footage gives the track a strange, nostalgic dream quality, combining images of leisure, nightlife, and homemade performance. Rather than following a conventional narrative, the video works as a collage of retro visual fragments, matching the song's pulsing electronic rhythm and the band's shift toward dance-oriented music.

Factoids & Trivia

• The video was made to promote "Dolphins," Mi Ami's 2011 release on Thrill Jockey. "Hard Up" is the opening track on the four-song record.

• "Dolphins" marked a major change for Mi Ami. After bassist Jacob Long left, the group continued as a duo, with Damon Palermo using a Roland 707 drum machine and a sampler that operated with floppy disks, while Daniel Martin-McCormick handled vocals and keyboards.

• The track was part of Mi Ami's move away from the guitar, bass, and drum-kit attack of their earlier records and toward synths, sequencers, drum machines, and electronic dance music.

• The soft-focus VHS footage and house-party scenes give the clip an intentionally low-budget, homemade character, a visual contrast to the severe, machine-driven pulse of the music.

• The video was circulated by Thrill Jockey through Vimeo during the promotional campaign for the release.