Soccer Mommy performs at The Blue Room at Third Man Records in 2024

Soccer Mommy at The Blue Room at Third Man Records, 6/9/2024

Soccer Mommy’s 2024 album Evergreen delves into the complexities of grief. Released in October, it focuses on the weird, thorny sides of the mourning process: displacement, indignity, endlessly playing Stardew Valley. It’s no surprise that Sophie Allison’s relationship with the songs should evolve. In June, she released a stripped-down version of Evergreen that peeled its layers back even further, exposing all of the nerves.

Now, after a year of touring, she’s coming home to Nashville to headline night two of Drkmttr Fest II. Happening Friday and Saturday, it’s the second annual fundraising benefit for the beloved East Nashville DIY space. She’s also watching lots and lots of horror movies. The Scene caught up with her about her plans for the show, the importance of protecting the Nashville arts scene and more. Our interview has been edited for length and clarity.

You just wrapped a fall tour, and you're also heading out for a few more dates in Asia in late November. It sounds like it's been a pretty busy season for you.

Yeah, it has. The last year has been a lot of touring, but the Asia stuff is kind of wrapping it up. So it should be pretty chill after that.

And you're going to be headlining night two of Drkmttr Fest II on Saturday. What can readers expect to hear during your set?

You know, a mix of songs, I think — stuff from every album that I have out. I haven't actually made the set list yet, but based on what I usually do, I’ll try to get all the hits in there. I’ll try to keep it upbeat and fun, I think. Maybe I'll be dressed in costume for Halloween. 

What’s your Halloween costume for this year?

I'm gonna be a frog! So that should be fun.

Your most recent album is Evergreen, which came out around this time last year. You released a stripped-down version of it in June. What made you want to revisit those songs?

I think that for this album, in particular, writing the songs felt really complete and honest and vulnerable. Just me and a guitar. Some of them on the album are obviously a little more stripped-back already, but I just wanted to take some of those ones that were done up a bit on the record and strip them back and give them that opportunity. I'm usually not one to want to do acoustic versions of stuff, but this felt like something where it was actually true to what the songs were.

The song “M” has a reference to “Your Dog,” a big early fan favorite of yours — the line, “I miss you like a loyal dog.” You've been putting out music for around 10 years now. Are you reflecting on your career so far at all?

Definitely, all the time. The older I get, the more it's just crazy to look back at how my life has gone by so quickly, and everything changed in a blink of an eye. I've never really known anything but doing this in my adult life, which is pretty amazing, and it's also crazy. 

I think I've changed a lot. The music has changed a lot, and it's constantly evolving. It's really cool, actually, to be able to look back at stuff that you've done to chronicle points in your life and think “Oh, that was my freshman year of college right there.” To have that look into your psyche is very interesting. I am constantly learning about myself through writing music.

You mentioned that you’re in the process of building your Drkmttr set list. How do you usually go about making those?

It partially comes down to guitar tunings. It’s definitely a big aspect of it. Because to make it smooth, transitionally — with the fact that I use mostly three guitar tunings throughout the set — I have to find a flow of songs all grouped together so it's not lots of breaks and lots of tuning.

I also like for there to be a flow in the sense that I think it's always good to start with popular songs and things that people are going to want to hear — upbeat stuff — and then dive into some of the deep cuts. I like to do a couple solo or stripped-back songs too, and then round it out by the end with more upbeat stuff. I just think it's good to have some of that fun and reflective, intimate type stuff mixed together, so there's never a lull.

You're very involved in the Nashville arts scene — you're also a Belcourt member. Could you talk a little bit about supporting that community here?

It's just like, I'm from here. It’s the world that I live in. When I'm not on tour, I'm not going to L.A. or New York or something and trying to fit into any other kind of social scene. I’m just hanging out with people I've known my whole life. So, yeah, those kinds of places are really important to me, just like everybody else in the community. I go to the Belcourt all the time. 

A place like Drkmttr is especially important because we don't have much in the sense of DIY venues. When I was maybe 20 years old, a lot of the house venues closed down. It was definitely a big hit for the scene, I think. Drkmttr’s one of those places that can keep going and support the scene a lot. I think it's really important for there to be those kinds of places, because that's where I came up, and that's where everyone I know came up playing music.

It’s hard to keep those places open too. It's hard to make money in that kind of business a lot of the time. So yeah, I think all of those kinds of places are just really important to the community, and that’s why you get to go to fun shows. It's why you get to go see indie films that you can't see at, like, a Regal or something like that. It's why you get that sense of community that would just disappear without those places.

Who are some Nashville artists that you think people should be paying attention to right now?

I think a really cool one right now is Total Wife. Super, super cool. I'm really into everything that they've got going on. They opened my Halloween show, like, two years ago, and it was super cool. They just put out an album too, which is really good. My friend Jennifer Jefferies is really awesome. Julian, from my band, makes music under the name MG, and that's really great. Baby Wave is cool, that's another one that's kind of popping off right now.

Last year you introduced a screening of Jennifer's Body at the Belcourt. Is that a movie that’s particularly important to you?

Yeah, it's one of my favorites. I love horror movies. I've already started my horror movie watching train this year, and I love Halloween too. Obviously, I'm really into Halloween, but horror movies are so much fun. All October, I’m always watching a bunch of them, and that one is one of my favorites. It's a perfect mixture of horror and gore and comedy and 2000s energy. It's just great, and there's nothing like it when it comes to the horror genre.

What other horror movies are you watching?

I just watched The Others. I watched the new I Know What You Did Last Summer the other day, actually, because I hadn't seen it, and I like the original. It was pretty good. It wasn't amazing or anything. 

I think I'm watching Jennifer's Body tomorrow night, actually, with some friends. I'm going to watch The Descent tonight, which I have not seen before, and everyone always says it's really great. I'm interested to see what's going on there. I watched Trouble Every Day. That one was really fucked up, but it was super good. That's kind of all I've done so far since I got back from tour [is watch horror movies].

Tags

Like what you read?


Click here to become a member of the Scene !