The group’s two members, Sean and Zack, have been playing together since they were teenagers, camping out in Zack’s mom’s house in Sacramento to write and record the songs they wrote. The duo’s first band, Leisure, dissolved in early 2003 after a few false starts, sending Zack to work construction and Sean to labor as a studio runner in LA. But they soon realized stopping wasn’t an option. Sean moved back to Sacramento and Zack began driving up every weekend from LA to write and rehearse music. After a year of commuting up and down the California coast, Zack relocated as well, solidifying a future for the pair’s new band, Middle Class Rut.

“I feel like the music we make needs to be heard,” Zack says. “Maybe everyone feels that way about their music, I don’t know. We struggled for a long time to find something that was us and as soon as we decided that we would do it ourselves everything clicked. Realizing we didn’t need anyone but ourselves to do this was important for this band. Now we want to get this out there and really get our own audience for our music.”