Soccer Mommy at Savannah Stopover 2022
photo by Stephanie Augello

Soccer Mommy on how Black Sabbath influenced her new LP: "It's really evil"

Soccer Mommy (Sophie Allison) released her excellent new Oneohtrix Point Never-produced album Sometimes, Forever today (read our review in Notable Releases and get it on limited milky clear vinyl), and certain tracks find her going in a darker direction than ever before, recalling anything from Portishead to Sylvia Plath to horror movies. One of her influences to go in this direction was Black Sabbath, as Sophie told Danielle Chelosky in an interview with UPROXX. “They are so heavy and doomy, and it can be slow and sludgy,” she said. “It feels heavy all the time, but it’s not like a thousand guitars or this crazy shredding. It’s really evil.”

In an interview with James Rettig for Stereogum, she also discussed other influences, including The Cure (“I think they do a really good job with that goth-ness while also being able to make it fun — having these really poppy songs that still have that edgy vibe. That’s something I really wanted to do with this record”), The Roches (“I’ve never loved putting on backing vocals, but this time it felt really almost instrumental. I was able to go in and done one line that moves here and another line that moves later, so it had this weaving in and out effect. And it was definitely very inspired by the Roches — to imagine what they would do to get these backing vocals for everything”), and more. Read more here.

Speaking about the allusion to Sylvia Plath’s suicide on “Darkness Forever” in an interview with Angie Martoccio for Rolling Stone, Sophie said, “The song got started when I literally had the thought, ‘I could imagine why you would want to do that.’ At the time, I was feeling very overwhelmed and paranoid, and my brain was on fire. The song is about taking that and twisting it into this idea of burning down your house and everything in it, including yourself, to expel the demons that live within you.”

Read our review of the album here and pick up our exclusive, limited milky clear vinyl variant of the album.

Speaking of Black Sabbath, Ozzy Osbourne also just announced a new solo album today (that features his Black Sabbath bandmate Tony Iommi, who’d never appeared on an Ozzy solo album before), and we’ve got an exclusive red, white & blue marble vinyl variant of that one up for pre-order now.

Soccer Mommy vinyl