Soccer Mommy is touching grass

Sophie Allison’s songwriting is rooted in feeling too much, all the time. On “Still,” the closing track of Sometimes, Forever, Allison sings, “I don’t know how to feel things small / It’s a tidal wave, or nothing at all.”

The Nashville singer-songwriter turned indie rock sensation has never shied away from using storytelling to deal with her personal truths; every new record is a chapter documenting the mildly excruciating, at times devastating, and always emotional journey of growing older. Her brand of emotionally vulnerable, guitar-focused rock is informed by her worship of artists the likes of Avril Lavigne and Liz Phair when she was younger, taking cues from their raw honesty and biting melodies. While her 2018 debut, Clean, was more stripped-down and bare, her subsequent efforts, color theory and Sometimes, Forever, dabbled with experimental instrumentation and noisy dissonance that teetered on the boundaries of shoegaze and dream-pop.

On Soccer Mommy’s latest record, evergreen, out October 25, Allison has decided to take herself back to her roots — quite literally. Deciding to forego complex production and wanting the songs to sound like their early demos, she crafted an album about the desolation and sadness that comes with grieving the loss of someone in her close circle, and what it takes to escape that darkness — even if that means going through it. For Soccer Mommy, there is no such thing as feeling too much of something.

“As I’ve gotten older, I’ve had more in-depth thoughts about change, and loss, and life in general,” Allison says. “When I was younger, I was driven by the anxiety of those inevitable things happening. It’s different when it does actually happen — it’s a lot of phases and it’s a constant thing. But it does change and it does get better, or it just gets less at the forefront of what you’re feeling all the time.”

During a September visit to Manhattan, Allison met up with The FADER to chat about her new album, how processing grief changes when you get older, and seeking comfort in Stardew Valley.

The FADER: I’m sorry to hear that you’ve been dealing with a big loss. You’ve touched on grief a lot in your music, be it the sense of losing yourself, or a relationship, or even your own innocence. This loss, however, feels more material. Tell me about your headspace as you started writing the record.

Sophie Allison: I think, particularly with loss, I’m really interested in seeing the beauty in things. I think when someone’s gone, or even if somebody’s just not literally around you anymore, there’s this energy in memories and in these remnants that are scattered in our lives.

It can be painful, but it can also be beautiful to still have that lingering. So I wanted to catch a lot of that in the songwriting, and I wanted to be really straightforward, intimate and raw. No frills. Getting down to the nitty gritty, like what I was doing when I was 17 years old.

Have you noticed yourself processing grief differently as you’ve gotten older?

I had a lot of change in my life when I was 18 years old, like everyone else. I was a disaster about everything. I was a complete mess. And I think I have a lot more understanding of my emotions and my own personal issues now than I used to.

Even in a situation with a loss of a person, it’s obviously going to feel terrible most of the time; it’s not going to feel good. There’s going to be a lot of complex feelings, but you can also still enjoy the memory of someone. It’s really easy to be like, “I don’t want to be reminded of this. I don’t want to think about this.” But you feel all of that and also feel comforted by your ghosts.

It comes in waves. Some days are worse than others.

I think that perspective is really everything. It might feel like the end of the world right now, but nothing’s been the end of the world, ever, literally. It all just keeps going, it all keeps moving, everything keeps happening, whether I want it to or not.

“Dreaming of Falling” is a bit darker than the others. It fills that space where you think nothing can ever get better and you’re trapped in the sadness forever. Can you tell me the story behind it?

I got COVID at a Charli xcx show and I was really sick writing that song. I think that’s why it’s a little more depressing and bogged down than some of the other ones. I think a lot of the songs on the album have these feelings of, “This is natural and it’s all gonna happen and it’s okay. I’m not gonna die from this.” But, this song doesn’t have that sentiment to it. Everything is different now and I don’t know what to do and it’s terrible. But also you can’t go back. It’s just not there anymore. So you’re stuck in this awful place, and it feels literally like half of your life is back there, and it’s all memory, and it’s all tainted.

On your last record, Sometimes, Forever, you talked about feeling jaded and disillusioned as a musician working in the industry. Has anything changed?

I still feel that way a lot of the time. It’s a world that I know I am not meant to be in, in the sense [that I want] to just write songs. But this is what I want to do, so I’m gonna do it. When I’m home and I’m not on tour, I’m still hanging out with the people I hung out with in high school, who know me for me.

You grow up idealizing it in your brain. When you’re a little kid, you’re like, “I want to be a pop star. I want to be a rock star,” or whatever. I think at a certain point over the past couple of years, I realized that it’s actually not what I want to do. I want to make music, but I don’t want to fit into any kind of mold other than that.

The album is more stripped-down than your previous records. You started experimenting with shoegaze and dissonance in recent work, but evergreen feels more bare. Was that a purposeful choice?

I wanted everything to feel natural and true to the demos of the songs, which are just acoustic guitar and vocals at the center. I was really inspired by nature with this album, whether it was writing lyrics that have that kind of stuff or wanting the music to feel like a nice warm breeze or leaves flying off the trees. Earthy and lush.

I remember very particularly the first time that I lived here, the first year in New York, and how awful winter felt. I remember that first day of spring when everyone was like, “Oh my God, it’s warm out, let’s go outside.” We were walking around for hours, sitting by the river. There’s nothing like it: being outside and feeling the elements.

You’ve gotta touch grass from time to time.

Yeah, literally. That’s something that was hard for me when I moved to New York, not being in a place that was super green. I didn’t realize it was gonna be so hard, but it really affected me. It’s just such a strong feeling of peacefulness, being at rest, being calm, and feeling a breeze.

Is Nashville green?

There’s trees everywhere. It’s very woodsy down there. I spent a lot of time out doing stuff in nature. I like living in a place like Nashville or any other city that’s smaller and kind of in a more lush area that’s not super skyscraper-type vibe. Once you’re in that a lot more, you just go do stuff. I’ll take my telescope out in front of my yard late at night and just be out looking at the planets and the moon and just standing out in the yard in, like, pajamas.

Tell me about the song “Abigail.”

She’s my wife in Stardew Valley. It’s my favorite game ever. There’s a lot of games I played growing up as a kid. I played a bunch of Pokémon, and I really played a lot of Harvest Moon. When I found out about Stardew, my life changed. Abigail is one of the characters; I love her. The song came about because I was in this phase where I’d written a lot of music for the album already. I guess, sonically, the chords didn’t feel like this sad expression, and it just felt something different. I had been playing Stardew and I was like, “Let’s just use this and make something for fun.” There are some hints for the Stardew fans in the lyrics.

How do you feel about growing closer to your 30s?

I’m definitely feeling it. I think this year when I turned 27, I was like, “I’m close to 30. I’m not in my early 20s anymore.” I’ll meet fans and I’m like, “You’re so cute. I love your vibe. I’m a grandma.” I don’t know how I got here, but I’m a grandma.

I’m Gen Z, technically. But honestly, I don’t get a lot of Gen Z stuff. Not in a way that I don’t like it, but I’m not in tune with it. I don’t even use TikTok.

I’m in a happy place and I have a lot to be thankful for. Honestly, when I look back to being young, I’m like, “Oh, this was so fun. This was so crazy.” But I’m also like, “I was not okay. I was not happy.” I feel a lot better now. And hopefully that just keeps getting better as I get older.