Interview by Mackenzie Seal

Before The Sophs had an established live presence, they had already finished their debut album, landed a deal with Rough Trade, and built a fanbase that knew every word. All it took was one cold email. 

GOLDSTAR, the debut record, isn't just an album. It's one very loud question running through every track: Am I actually a good person? "The idea of the gold star," lead singer Ethan Ramon explains, "is that you think once you get it, you'll finally feel settled." Ten tracks later, that feeling of completion never quite arrives, and that's exactly the point.

GOLDSTAR releases on March 13th 2026, and The Sophs aren't wasting any time. Their tour starts in the US this month, with shows kicking off in Austin, Texas from the 12th-14th of March. After finishing up across US cities they are heading to the UK and Europe, taking in cities across France, Belgium, Germany, and the Netherlands. The summer begins with major festivals including Primavera Sound in Barcelona and Primavera Porto in Portugal. Tickets and RSVPs for all dates are available at https://thesophs.com/tour.

With an album soon to be released and a full tour on the way, we sent The Sophs our questions. Here's what frontman Ethan Ramon had to say.

Q: You cold-emailed Rough Trade, and they were in your inbox the next day. What was the initial reaction, and at what point did you actually believe this was real?

A: Honestly my first reaction was that it probably wasn’t real. When you cold-email thirty labels you kind of assume you’re just shouting into the void. Seeing Rough Trade respond the next day felt like a clerical error. It didn’t really feel real until we were actually in a meeting talking about the album track by track. Up until that point I kept assuming someone would eventually say “sorry, wrong band.”

Q: You had the album finished before you ever played a show. How do you sit on something you’re that proud of without losing your mind waiting for people to hear it?

A: You mostly just annoy your friends with it. We finished GOLDSTAR before we were really a live band, so for a while the only audience was the six of us and whoever happened to be in the car. The upside is that by the time we started playing shows, the songs were already very lived-in. We’d spent so long with them privately that performing them almost felt like letting people into a secret we’d been keeping.

Q: There's a lot of pressure on debut albums to define a band. Did you feel that weight while making GOLDSTAR, or did you try to tune it out?

A: We honestly weren’t thinking about debut album pressure because we assumed nobody would hear it. We had already finished and scrapped a whole other record before GOLDSTAR, so by the time we made this one the goal was just to make something we actually liked. The pressure came later, once people started asking questions about it.

Q: GOLDSTAR is essentially asking, “Am I a good person?” which is something our whole generation wrestles with. Do you think social media plays a part in this?

A: I think social media gives everyone a scoreboard for their morality. You’re constantly seeing how people react to things, what opinions are “correct,” what behavior gets rewarded or punished. It can make you very aware of how you’re being perceived, but not necessarily more aware of who you actually are. A lot of the album lives in that gap.

Q: Every track title on the album is in full caps except track 9, “They Told Me Jump, I Said How High.” That feels intentional. Was there a deeper meaning behind that choice?

A: The track was originally named something a little more provocative, also in all caps. But the suits stepped in and requested we change the title. I agreed to change it, but I felt embarrassed about my decision. The new title is a cheeky nod to that embarrassment. I left it lowercase as a bit of a self-effacing move. As weird as it sounds, because I compromised, I didn’t think I deserved an album with cohesive titling. I wanted the lowercase title to stick out like a sore thumb when I looked at the track list. To be a constant reminder for me. 

Q: The album jumps from flamenco to garage rock to vaudeville. Is that a conscious push against genre “rules” or just what happens when six people are creating together?

A: It’s mostly just six people in a room with very different tastes. Someone will bring in something that feels like a garage song, someone else hears a flamenco rhythm in it, someone else thinks it should sound like a song from a 1920s theater. We’re not really sitting there trying to break genre rules. It’s more like we’re too disorganized to follow them.

Q: What's one thing about being in a band in 2026 that nobody really warns you about?

A: How much of the job is internet-adjacent. There’s still the romantic image of being in a band, but a lot of the reality is editing videos, posting things, answering messages, thinking about how people will encounter your music online. It’s a strange mix of art project and small media company.

Q: How has the energy of the crowd during your shows evolved as fans are getting more familiar with your music and the lyrics?

A: Early on people were mostly just curious. They were trying to figure out what kind of band we were. Now there are moments where people are actually singing the lyrics back, which is a pretty surreal feeling. You write something alone in a room and then suddenly there’s a whole crowd yelling it at you.

Q: The album asks where your ‘gold star’ is. Do you think getting signed and quickly gaining an audience answered that question, or did it just move goalposts?

A: It mostly moved the goalposts. The idea of the “gold star” is that you think once you get it you’ll finally feel settled. But every time you reach something you wanted, the brain just invents a new thing you’re supposed to want instead. So in that sense the album’s question still hasn’t really been answered.

Q: What is something fans can look forward to from The Sophs this year? 

A: A lot more shows, and a lot more chaos. Now that the album will be out in the world we finally get to treat the songs like living things instead of files on a hard drive. They tend to mutate a little on stage, which is the fun part.

For a band still waiting on their gold star, The Sophs seem to be exactly where they need to be. GOLDSTAR is out March 13th on all major streaming platforms, details and tour dates can be found on their website linked below.

FOLLOW THE SOPHS: WEBSITE // INSTAGRAM // TIKTOK // YOUTUBE

Interview from March 2026