Growing up can be an anomaly. It can be both the beauty and the loss that come with it, and it always has its ups and downs. Singer-songwriter Jake Minch embodies the pain of leaving home on his latest single, “Drawing a Tattoo.”
The guitar-driven song, which comes ahead of his highly anticipated debut album, George, leans heavily on Minch’s introspective and melancholic songwriting. The album opens with detailed, cinematic imagery (“Drawing a tattoo / Hands like a bird”) and a tender vulnerability that cuts deep. Kind of like a nostalgic hug, Minch reflects on moments of young love that’s filled with warmth and awkward yet honest times.
The song is anchored in this nostalgia and desperate need to hold on. On it, Minch sings, “There’s a person who stays and a person who leaves / You said I gotta keep moving.” He subtly paints a picture for the listener of all this pain and hurt he’s experienced and what he’s trying to let go of. From his mother getting a second job to his father’s death and losing his hometown friends, Minch shares these flashes of silliness, which make the loss sharper, because it was once so vibrant and real. And ultimately, an abrupt change in his life makes him re-contemplate things (“You call me to tell me you got a girl pregnant / You’re keeping the baby, you’re leaving Connecticut”).
A song that sees Minch learn about the love that teaches you who you are — between changing roles, to growing into choices you once judged, Minch says:
“This is a song about leaving home because there was no other choice. It’s an amalgamation of the lives and memories of me and the friends I left when I moved to LA, along with the things I would tell myself to keep my feet on the ground. It’s partially a callout to my own inability to change without needing to feel better than everyone else.”
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