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Since 2010, Middle Class Fashion<\/a> has been creating catchy, textured, and, in some notable instances, criminal<\/a> sounds. At times charming and other times deliberately rough around the edges, the longstanding St. Louis act has garnered a well-earned reputation for making music on their own terms.<\/p>\n Outlasting many of their contemporaries, Middle Class Fashion has endured through musical flexibility and evolution. Originally founded as a duo by singer and keyboardist Jenn Malzone and guitarist Brad Vaughn, over the years MCF saw a number of members shift in and out of its ranks before ultimately adding guitarist\/vocalist Lindsey McDanel and drummer Matt F. Basler. The group\u2019s most recent addition, bassist Dylan Clubb, signed on in 2021. This Saturday, January 31, that solidified lineup will celebrate the release of its first album together, With Affection<\/em>, the band\u2019s sixth overall, with a show at Off Broadway.<\/a><\/p>\n Subscribe to the St. Louis Music newsletter to discover upcoming concerts, local artists to watch, and more across an eclectic playlist of genres.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n We will never send spam or annoying emails. Unsubscribe anytime.<\/p>\n As Malzone explains, making a new album wasn\u2019t originally the intention.<\/p>\n \u201cIt started with just releasing singles,\u201d she says. \u201cWe wanted to put out songs as we made them. I wanted to take advantage of getting singles out quickly and seeing how they went over. But after a while, I realized that those singles, plus some other new songs I wrote, comprised an album.\u201d<\/p>\n Initially, Malzone says, she thought of the tracks as akin to individual journal entries\u2014slices of life recorded as a view into the window of her day-to-day reality. But over time, she began to feel like they represented a more cohesive theme. Taking nearly two years to record, compile, and complete, the finished product touches on themes of solitude and romance while giving listeners a glimpse into Malzone\u2019s world.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cFor this album, I was looking at seemingly mundane moments in life and framing those, like finding a lost dog and sitting with it on the porch,\u201d Malzone says. \u201cI also sing about dating someone and buying them a pair of lavender Chucks because I had a good time, but then they thought that meant we were going to get married, and I realized I just wanted to be friends. Basically, I discovered that many of them were looking at happenings in life, not romanticizing so much as just finding little moments and framing them.\u201d<\/p>\n Recorded at Suburban Pro Studios with Matthew Sawicki, With Affection<\/em> meshes shoegaze-like textures with bubblegum-pop sweetness. It opens with the soaring \u201cCriminal Sound,\u201d <\/em>a love letter Malzone wrote for her accomplices. Racy and euphoric, it starts slowly before the drums and guitars pick up the tempo. The result is a slaphappy burst of pop that announces the arrival of a band whose maturation has come full circle.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s definitely a love song for my bandmates, because my longest and most successful relationship is with the band,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n Malzone\u2019s sense of melody is apparent on two slower songs in a decidedly more romantic oeuvre, \u201cSavory\u201d and \u201cNorth Star.\u201d <\/em>The former begins with a nifty bass solo that wraps around her voice before cascading into a guitar-and-drum throwdown. The latter opens with a quieter guitar solo before unfurling into a dose of gushy love pop.<\/p>\n The rest of the album\u2019s 10 songs further showcase MCF\u2019s considerable range. More infectious grooves are found on the rocky giddyup of \u201cViolet,\u201d a track elevated by Basler\u2019s drumming, which alternates from strafing to thumping rhythms. Boppy harmonies and searing guitars round it out, making the track a stomper.<\/p>\n \nGet a guide to the region\u2019s booming music scene<\/h4>\n