29 Best Songs About Tattoos
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21. “Another Tattoo” by “Weird Al” Yankovic
Song Year: 2011
With the king of parodies still churning out music, no song is safe. That includes Bruno Mars’ “B.o.B.,” which Yankovic repurposes here to sing as a heavily tattooed person who seems much more obsessed with quantity over quality. There are misspellings, tattoos of singers and pop culture figures, babies, weapons, aliens, and a clarinet-playing Boba Fett.
22. “Tattoo” by Hilary Duff
Song Year: 2015
Ed Sheeran penned this sad piece about the ending of a relationship and what it leaves behind. That may be good memories or the inability to return to that restaurant you both loved but is too painful to visit these days. Whatever it is, there’s always something.
Sheeran’s melody sits beautifully in Hilary Duff’s range, and you can hear the pain in her voice.
23. “New Tattoo” by Saving Abel
Song Year: 2008
“New Tattoo” tells the raucous story of a chance encounter that results in a short but torrid affair. Once the pair have spent a weekend in a hotel room, they decide to get out and do something.
What else to do other than get a tattoo? That’s what the woman does, and shortly thereafter, she’s gone. The ghosted narrator then goes and gets his own new tattoo in hopes of remembering what shaped up to be one hell of a weekend.
24. “Queer Tattoo” by Stephen Lynch
Song Year: 2012
Stephen Lynch is a singing comedian who writes songs that hit people pretty hard. In “Queer Tattoo,” he takes aim at tattoo culture in general— or at least the people who get tattoos for silly reasons.
There’s the guy whose tattoo is misspelled, there’s a barbed-wire guy, and many cliched tats are getting lampooned here.
Lynch makes a point in one of the later verses to specify that by “queer,” he means “bad,” not “gay.” He goes on to describe what an actual gay tattoo would be, complete with rainbows and pink triangles.
25. “Tattoo” by Hunter Hayes
Song Year: 2014
Another song linking the permanence of a tattoo to the hope for the future of a new relationship, “Tattoo” comes from the point of view of a narrator who casually decides that a tattoo of his new love’s name seems like a pretty good idea.
The song is not autobiographical, as Hunter Hayes has made a point of remaining ink-free.
26. “The One That Got Away” by Katy Perry
Song Year: 2010
It’s common for songs to have stories of people getting tattoos in their quest to prove their love to each other. Katy Perry sings about that in “The One That Got Away,” but the song also contains that rare lyrical content about the narrator’s ex getting his tattoo removed.
When young couples get their matching ink, the world is magical at the time. Learning later that your ex doesn’t have his anymore ends up being sadder than you’d expect. At least that’s according to Perry.
27. “Tattoo” by Ava Max
Song Year: 2020
“Tattoo” finds Ava Max’s narrator comparing herself to a tattoo. She contends that she’s the permanent addition to her love interest. Her tattoo metaphor includes the fact that you don’t forget your first one, so she knows he’ll always remember her, and the idea that tattoos can hurt just like love can from time to time.
28. “Angel with Tattoos” by Skylar Grey
Song Year: 2019
Skylar Grey’s pop ballad is a melancholy meditation on our tendencies to judge people on their appearances.
The narrator sings to her love interest, whose mother doesn’t like her. The narrator admits to making mistakes in the past and compares herself to an angel with tattoos. The idea is that even if you don’t like tattoos, who doesn’t like angels? She just wants to be given a chance.
29. “Black Tattoo” by FM Static
Song Year: 2011
A woman caught in an unhealthy and possibly abusive relationship finally has enough of it all in FM Static’s “Black Tattoo.” She decides to leave the relationship and return to being the woman she was meant to be.
Tattoos done in all black can be starker and more striking than some of their multi-colored counterparts. She wants to show the world who and what she is with the same stark power.
Top Songs About Tattoos, Final Thoughts
The permanence of tattoos figures prominently in many songs about body art, and songwriters have written a lot of music about love and loss using imagery related to them. Nods to the pain of getting a tattoo are also common and often hearken back to the pain of a breakup. And if you have a tattoo of the person who dumped you? It hurts that much more.
