blackbear Breaks Down His Tattoos

[Interviewer] Is there anywhere off limits

that you wouldn't tattoo?

My dick. I'm gonna leave my dick alone.

I know people that don't.

[hip hop beat]

What up GQ?

It's Blackbear, and we're gonna check out some of my ink.

[Interviewer] What was your first tattoo?

I was gonna go for the sleeve thing,

and then I quit really ear--

My sleeve career was ended.

I started, like most people, on my arm.

That's why I have, like, crazy...

I was like 14, 15 and I have a flying pig over here,

like when pigs fly.

I thought that was cool. [laughs]

So, I was like, Let's do a cityscape, pigs flying...

It says, Imagine here, like the Beatles,

or the John Lennon song.

There's a cloud with a pirate patch on.

It just makes no sense.

[hip hop beat]

So, I've been getting tattooed for, like,

I don't know, I'm 28 now.

My parents always just were like, Oh man.

Nothing shocked them at that point, I think.

I already had lip rings and ridiculous clothes,

and I just would not conform to any, you know, super edgy.

That's really bad. [laughs]

My plan is to actually start blasting big black tattoos

over it, like different ones because it's faded

over the years enough to where I can do that, I think.

But, who knows, maybe the pig will survive.

[Interviewer] How many tattoos do you think you have?

I have one big tattoo, starts here, goes here. [laughs]

I don't know.

Hundreds.

I probably have in the high hundreds.

I think I lost count when I started moving

to my hands and neck.

Then, it's over.

I have this style of tattooing,

where I don't like sleeve-work as much for me, personally.

I like it on other people,

certain people it looks really cool, like the Rock.

For me, I like almost like the Amy Winehouse style

of tattoos everywhere.

I've always loved her tattoos.

I tell people this all the time,

that if I could go back and not get one,

I wouldn't have any.

But, I'm like an all or nothing person,

and that's just how I am with everything.

So, that's just kind of how it happened.

It's a product of my brain, is how I look, yeah.

I have some good ones, where I'm like, This is good.

I have a T-Mobile Sidekick right here.

That's a good one.

Logo for Alkaline Trio, punk rock band.

This one Halsey drew on me at my house,

and I got it tattooed the next day.

They all have a cool story.

I have this one, business in the front,

and then party in the back.

Drink bleach 13 because I got it on Friday the 13th,

so it was like free.

Matching tattoo with like four of my friends,

says shitbag here.

I got this one in New York,

when I did the Gucci Ghost Party.

I performed for Fashion Week, so Trouble Andrew drew this

and a bunch of Gucci stuff on me.

So, it's like real Gucci skin, kinda a cool thing.

I kinda just tell the people,

I let people who are good at things do what...

I can't decorate my house at home, like

I let the interior designer do that.

I've tried it before, and my ways are not always awesome.

So, yeah, I've let people draw them out.

I just tell my ideas, and sometimes I'll doodle,

but it's just horrible.

So, I'll just stick to music for now.

Yeah, there's so many stories.

That's my favorite part about getting tattoos

is that I can look at them and think about where I was,

or why it was funny.

Some of them are funny, some of them are serious,

but mainly, mainly I have a bunch of fuckery on my body.

[hip hop beat]

[Interviewer] Do you have a specific artist

that you like to go to or just kinda anyone?

I do.

Shout out Kelly at Teen Hearts Tattoos.

He does everything from the neck down.

He's done my whole torso, and everything like that.

He's just as crazy as me I think, at least artistically.

He's down for any crazy idea that I have.

Where did the idea for bat-cat come from?

Tumblr, I think he was a real thing.

It was like Photoshopped, and I was like,

I want the bat-cat.

It was a cover up, because I tried to get the house from Up

with the balloons, and it just looked really horrible.

So, we needed something big and black to cover it up,

which is awesome three-eyed bat-cat.

There's a giant cry for help here.

I did it myself, so that's special.

There's a lot of fuckery going on.

I did the 27 grave myself, on my 27th birthday,

like five of my friends, we did it at my house.

Oh this is cool.

Nice, lovely fuck.

Yeah, I got internet troll here, too.

Which is cool.

Not like I'm a cyber-bully or anything

because that's how that's taken sometimes,

but I'm a product of the internet.

If it weren't for the internet,

I wouldn't even be sitting here right now.

If it weren't for SoundCloud, stuff like that.

I've kinda trolled my way into being a millionaire.

[hip hop beat]

Beartrap here, it's the name of my record label,

Beartrap Sound, so it actually just fit on the fingers,

and I figured why not do that.

E-S-T 1990, that's when I was born.

Mom and dad, these are kinda like stick and pokes, too.

I have the all-seeing eye, like God's,

you know, the third eye.

A treasure chest, it's kind of busted.

I think kids are really going OD right now,

and not tattooing anywhere else.

And, I think in tattoo culture,

to start on your neck and hands and face

before you have tattoos everywhere else

and you're kind of running out of space,

it's kind of looked down upon.

At least, in tattoo culture, but live your life.

If you want to tattoo your face,

just remember it's there forever.

I'm not sure which side I'm looking at,

but I think there's a bear paw here.

So, the bear paw is because I'm Blackbear,

which is pretty cool,

and then over here is Flagler Beach, Florida

where I grew up.

The compass traditionally is a nautical cool thing to add,

but I don't know, leads me home.

Death's always following me.

It's kind of like a morbid tattoo, but I think it's cool.

It's traditional; it's awesome.

I think there's a pound sign here,

Beartrap, loverboy here I think...

[Interviewer] Why loverboy?

[snickers] Why not?

The guy who did it, his whole brand is, loverboy

and like all this stuff,

so it was like really an honor to get Alex Miller

to write loverboy here.

On my back, I have The Serenity Prayer tattooed really big

by my friend Alex Miller who also did my loverboy here.

One of my favorite prayers,

it's super deep and super simple.

It's great.

[Interviewer] Casper on the side of your head?

Yes, I do.

I got it during the music video shoot

for my song High One Time.

It's awesome because it's there forever,

and it's like when I shot that video.

I did it on a picnic table on the side of some pool

that the kids were skating and stuff.

It was like really cool.

[Interviewer] Sweet! Let's talk about the chest.

I was just like, Bro, go crazy.

And, he went crazy.

No, the way we do it is we set it up,

we take a picture of my body and we put it in Photoshop,

and we actually put them on first.

So everything, the way that you see it, was meant to be

even though it doesn't look like it's supposed to be at all.

This is dead to you, which is pretty cool.

That's one of the things that we Photoshopped as well.

We just put it on there.

It's funny because you can see it in my newest album cover,

on Anonymous, you can see that it says dead

which is really cool.

It's kind of like an underlying theme of Blackbear.

I think I drink too much, right here where I have a scar

from a surgery I had from pancreatitis

from actually drinking too much.

It was a horrible, long three months in the hospital.

I was fighting for life.

So, I don't drink anymore.

Three years now, I haven't drank.

But, that's why I have that and the devil's hand going

through the scar here.

The scar healed up really nicely, thank God.

Yeah, I had Coco Capitan,

the girl who wrote on the Gucci bags.

I don't know what the Gucci bag says,

but I know mine says, What is this future

going to do with us?.

I think the Gucci bag said,

What are we going to do with all this future?.

So, it's really cool

that I have a special Coco Capitan from Gucci.

This my friend Boogie, it's two hands shaking,

but it's also kind of a nice equality tattoo

of just black dude, white dude,

you know we're friends, we're homies.

Thanks for listening to my horrible stories

about my horrible tattoos.

I'm Blackbear; I'll be coming back soon.

Thank you GQ.