Frost-bitten Atlanta didn’t stop fans from crowding under the warm fluorescents of Variety Playhouse for the first leg of Soccer Mommy’s 2025 tour. There was a murmur of hesitancy; each song left a surprise with no setlist to dissect beforehand.
The opener, L’Rain, began her performance, a mesh of voices overlapping lush instrumentals. Taja Cheek, the main vocalist, quipped that being from New York, she felt as if the cold weather was her fault.
After the opening set, Soccer Mommy, the stage name of Sophie Allison, entered the stage amidst the quiet chaos of shuffling equipment and tuning guitars. The crowd stood quiet, subdued until Allison walked towards the microphone. Behind her hung a circle wrapped by a garland of ivy and pink petals, swirling projections of flowers and butterflies. Small planters of fake flowers frame the stage, creating a warm, earthy atmosphere.
The audience remained muted, perhaps due to this being the tour’s first show. Despite her name, Soccer Mommy did not exude a bold, commanding stage presence — but what she brought a subtle harmony, a captivating calmness. She seemed like someone you could relate to, the girl who sat next to you in your high school English class. Her music, too, emanates a sense of nostalgia, as if drawing up memories of a hazy, distant summer.
Allison opened with the queer ballad “Abigail,” and it felt poignant to begin with a song titled by a person’s name. This trend has existed since her first album, with songs like “Henry,” “Lucy” and even the vague “M” of her October 2024 LP “Evergreen.” One of Allison’s talents is enveloping the listener within her world, immersing her web of personal, experiential storytelling.
She played “Circle the Drain,” a favorite of her 2020 album “Color Theory.” She sang softly, gazing downward. From “Evergreen,” she played “Some Sunny Day” and “Driver” — a punchy number that captures the essence of indie-rock. It’s followed up by two more of her darker tunes, “Shotgun” and “Bones” from her 2022 album “Sometimes, Forever.”
The climax is, fittingly, the quietest part of the night. The opening chords to “Still Clean” drape a gentle hush over the crowd. It’s just Allison — no background drums, guitar or keys. The lyrics and emotions were stripped bare on stage, just the quiet strum of Allison’s sparkly pink electric guitar and warm voice, confessional and tinted by sentimentality, gently narrating a fading young love.
Her music embodies a 2010s sound, the kind of song heard on a college radio or the end of a coming-of-age movie. Maybe because Allison grew up in Nashville, her songs conjure memories of a southern summer — alive, warm and sweet. It’s the same energy she carries with her on stage, one of familiar comfort and sentimentality — sweet tea on a back porch, shouldered between old friends. It’s a resurgence of youth and finding identity, of making mistakes and freshly bruised knees and hearts.
“Play ‘Switzerland’!” someone in the crowd remarked, referencing the song off her first album.
“I don’t know how!” Allison answered, “I was sixteen when I wrote it!”
The fumbling inexperience of adolescence is one that the next song “royal screw up” captures perfectly. It is falling apart and being glued back together, again and again.
“This is the last song,” Allison said, about “Your Dog,” but the band returned minutes later for an encore. “In the car with the backseat, southern summer,” she opened during the encore with “Scorpio Rising,” another old song off her 2018 album “Clean.” The show concluded with “Don’t Ask Me,” airy and light as she retired the audience back to the post-snow chill. But for just a moment, Soccer Mommy brought back a sliver of summer.