Sophie Allison, who performs under the moniker Soccer Mommy, has never shied away from processing her emotions through her songwriting. The singer/songwriter's vulnerability resulted in two critically acclaimed releases — 2018's Clean and 2020's Color Theory — though Allison's latest may be her most exciting yet.
Sometimes, Forever (which arrived June 24) feels even more personal, giving a glimpse at Allison's psyche as she untangles a web of complex feelings. The 25-year-old's music has often fallen within the serene, guitar-driven indie pop of her singer-songwriter contemporaries, but Sometimes, Forever takes listeners to new heights with the addition of moody synths that add a dark texture to the album as a whole.
To amplify the darker moods on Sometimes, Forever, Allison partnered with famed electronic artist and producer Daniel Lopatin (a.k.a. Oneohtrix Point Never) as producer, who has worked with artists including the Weeknd, FKA Twigs and Rosalía. Together, they explored a darker sound that fits the intensity of her gripping lyrics.
In conversation with GRAMMY.com, Allison talks about the process of putting together Sometimes, Forever, the fun of exploring darkness, and the challenges that come with being part of the music industry.
It was a pleasant surprise to see you work with Daniel Lopatin (also known as Oneohtrix Point Never), and it's the perfect match. When your label connected you two to discuss him potentially producing Sometimes, Forever, what were those initial conversations like?
I sent him the songs before we talked about anything — you know, just the demos — and it was just stuff like him asking me, "What are you wanting to do on this record? What's the vibe you are on?" And I kind of gave a general idea for the sonics that I wanted.
And then it was just kind of bouncing off ideas, bringing up stuff that he thought would be cool and things that he wanted to try to do with the record, and same on my end. From loving his music, I could tell that anything we'd do together would be really exciting and fun.
Now that you're on tour for Sometimes, Forever, I'm curious about whether you're playing around with the composition of the songs. How have you brought the album to life during live shows?
These songs were actually easier than ever to learn to play live, even though there's some really interesting synth parts and guitar parts layered up. It's just ambiance and little melodies here and there that have been added on in a lot of parts. So it was very easy to just kind of play what we played when we recorded the record, and maybe add a couple little parts on top.
They feel very fun and exciting and upbeat, even though there's a lot of darker ideas on the record. The songs themselves… don't feel that emotionally charged, personally. On Color Theory, the "darker" songs were more just very sad and aching. So these ones are more fantastical, and it kind of gives you that sense of like turning your own demons and your own struggles into fantasy that makes it kind of fun.
There are heavier moments, but it also weaves in fantastical storytelling with elements of witchiness and the supernatural like in "Following Eyes." You've said before that this song in particular isn't metaphorical; you just wanted to tap into those storytelling abilities. So how did the idea for it come about?
Other stuff on the album, like "Darkness Forever," that's just a story. It's the story of this evil to me. There's levity there, even though obviously it's dark. To me, there's this sense of, like, having fun with evil, and I love to do that kind of stuff. I love darkness and fantasy. But not only in a sense, that has to be upsetting and sad. It's also nice to be able to have fun with dark themes and gothic ideas.
When I wrote "Following Eyes," we had already started recording the record. I thought the record was done, but I wrote this little guitar riff that I was really liking that was kind of dark. I wanted to write a horror song just for fun. And once I wrote it, it just fit so well with the record that I had to put it on there.
It seems like there's a connecting theme throughout some of the songs, where you challenge the pressure that young women in the industry face, like in "Unholy Affliction" and "Still." Do you find that pressure has become easier to deal with?
In some ways. I think that I've removed myself from a lot of situations that I didn't want to really be in. But I don't think that the pressure for any artist has let up at all.
Honestly, I don't think it's really the fault of any one specific person or area of the industry and the world. Like, I think that it's all just trying to sell your art and sell you as an artist so that you can make money and have success. Most of us do have to make money at this if we want to have it as our job.
I've been thinking about the pressure that so many artists feel to brand themselves on social media and put themselves in vulnerable situations online. You've recently talked about no longer being active on social media, so I'm sure it helps a bit too to not have to deal with that.
Here's the thing: I am off social media, but I'll log on every once in a while, check the DMs, see what's going on. Just not living on it, for me, it just makes me feel more positive about things. It makes me feel more positive about interactions with people that I get to have in real life rather than on the internet, where it can just be someone that's just bored and trying to be an assh***.
Sometimes, Forever feels like a "no holds barred" kind of album, where you're experimenting with a new sound and exploring heavier topics. There's often a lack of boundaries surrounding how artists discuss mental health struggles in their music, so was that something you were concerned about when doing press for the record?
I think that the record isn't necessarily more personal than anything else I've made. If I don't want to talk about something, I can always just fairly rudely try not to…. [but] it sucks having to shut people down when they want to know about something.
But at the same time, if you have something in a song that's obviously a personal issue to ask about it, that's just an invasion of privacy. You wouldn't ask someone about their deep personal issues just because you heard about it from somebody else.
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