On this, her fourth album, Sophie Allison, aka Soccer Mommy, writes candidly and beautifully about life and everything woven into it.
Evergreen is a tender, gentle record that wonderfully relates to Allison’s earliest work. Allison’s writing is strong and shines brighter than ever. The songs are complex and attack the senses with a warm hug and a sharp wit. They aren’t about moving on from grief but about living within it, learning and growing, and continuing to move forward despite yesterday’s yearning.
Opening with “Lost”, you are instantly drawn in. It’s a beautiful, orchestral delight and feels like a hybrid of Julien Baker meeting Iron & Wine. Allison’s harmonic daydream vocals pour out of the speakers like the finest of wines whilst the gentle, orchestral sounds push the song along fluidly “Lost in a way that don’t make sense / Lost in a way that never ends” is an incredibly relatable chorus to anyone who has genuinely felt lost or a loss.
“M” is upliftingly bleak. “I don’t mind talking to empty halls.” is such a heartbreakingly earnest line that stands out across the song “I feel you even though you’re gone” and “I hear your voice in all your favourite songs” continue that theme of missing someone so much that it is killing you. Allison is hurting yet delivering the most beautiful of songs.
“Driver” is more of a rockier number; it reminded me of The Breeders with its angular guitar riff and heavy bass. It also seems to nod to Brooklyn’s Momma with the hazy guitars layered over the vocals. “Some Sunny Day” is a shiny, glowing song that Allison has written about knowing she can still see her loved one’s face “only when I close my eyes” The vocals have a natural haunting echo about them as if they were airdropped from heaven itself.
“Changes” is another acoustic ballad, written about what we lose as time marches on, feeling the changes we don’t want to face in life but ultimately have to. Allison recorded in Atlanta with producer Ben H. Allen III (Deerhunter, Animal Collective, Youth Lagoon, Belle and Sebastian) and decided to ditch the synthesizers featured on her previous record, 2022’s Sometimes, Forever, and lean back into the acoustic daydream that her career began with.
Allison often wrote quickly, verses and choruses piling up after months of contemplating all that had gone missing. A frank glimpse into nostalgia and the troubles it can bring, “Thinking of You” came together in 10 minutes. “How long is too long to be stuck in a memory?” she asks. “Dreaming Of You” is another dreamy yet devastatingly honest song. “And I can feel the memory tainted / By the way I’ve changed” is something incredibly relatable to how we learn to grow with grief and its coping mechanism.
“Salt In Wound” is exactly like the title would suggest, a painful, mournful song that remains upbeat with its jangly, R.E.M influenced guitars. It is gritty yet gloriously written and is probably the track that will warrant the most investigation, sat alone in a darkened room with headphones on or walking alone at night down an empty street.
“She cannot fade/She is so evergreen” is the closing statement on the record and is an emotionally poignant one. Allison wrote this record as she grew into her late twenties, reaching out and moving on from her childhood into being an adult, “Evergreen” is a mature, profoundly introspective collection of songs that are incredibly personal yet emotionally available to anyone who cares to listen. Even the artwork suggests a grey, gloomy world with hope on the horizon and the dawn of a new day. Hope is important, and so is this record; dive in and get lost in it.
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