Sophie Allison, known to the world under her pseudonym Soccer Mommy, is living up to her own Bandcamp description “chill but kinda sad” with her new full-length album Clean. Following up to her 2017 Collection EP, Clean is simply written and incredibly relatable. Graced with 10 tracks concerning the setbacks and pains of love, obsession and self-loathing, Clean displays real human emotion conveyed through hazy vocals. It also shows a path of huge growth from the home-recorded releases Songs For The Recently Sad (2015) and Songs From My Bedroom (2016) and Allison is confidently emerging from the slow but sure rise of her previous work whilst maintaining many elements of earlier creations.

‘Still Clean’ is the sad and soft opener that you would expect, it pulls on the subject of heartache and seclusion with sad guitar strums similar to those from ‘Allison’, the opening track on 2017’s Collection EP. ‘Blossom (Wasting All My Time)’ sings of a relationship not built for lasting, bringing a swell of emotion between slow strums. “I don’t wanna be your fucking dog that you drag around / a collar on my neck tied to a pole, leave me in the freezing cold” Allison rails against possessiveness in relationships on the fiercely written ‘Your Dog’.

‘Cool’ has a lighthearted and easy flowing sound, throughout the song, Allison glamorizes someone called Mary who “has a heart of coal”. This song touches on subjects of self-deprecation and longing to be someone else. “I wanna know like you / I wanna be that cool”. A similar theme is sung about on ‘Last Girl’ “I want to be like your last girl / she’s got looks that drive you wild” and “why would you still want to be with me / when she’s got everything you’ll ever need”.

Clean is simple and honest. It is easy listening to anyone, but so much more for people who know the pains written about in this album. Sophie Allison, under her Soccer Mommy guise, is getting in line with the surge of talented young female artists, the likes of Julien Baker, Phoebe Bridgers, Mitski and Adult Mom, who are using sweet melancholy sounds combined with lyrics of trauma, weakness, self-destruction and heartache among other things to shatter stigmas and connect to audiences. (8/10) (Rebecca Corbett)

Listen to Clean by Soccer Mommy here via Spotify, and tell us what you think below!