Music City Tattoo

Love this place! Mike is great! I stopped in while visiting Nashville a couple weeks ago. We ended up with 3 tattoos in 2 days!
Highly recommend Music City Tattoo!
I live in Chicago and will travel back for my next tattoo!

So. I found myself wanting to finish a tattoo I had started last year.

But...

It required text.

I was a little scared.

I started searching for artists. I asked friends to search for artists. I asked my fellow Yelpers for recommendations of artists....

Ya see, I wasn't going to go to just anyone; I needed someone GREAT.

After an exhaustive search, and some superb referrals, I found an artist...finally.

I emailed Chris Boyle, and learned due to the closing of East Side Iron, he has moved over to Music City Tattoo on Music Row. Since MCT is undergoing a website revamp (and he's fairly new to this team), he referred me to his Instagram profile to check out his work.

I loved it.

We conversed a bit through email, and agreed to meet at the shop on a late Friday afternoon to discuss my design further. Lucky for me, no charge for a consultation.

I was greeted warmly by several members of the staff (or perhaps the owners?) as I walked through the front door. Chris immediately came out to meet me.

We discussed my design, and he carefully examined the existing work I had. He then made some great recommendations to make my addition look better and last longer.
I had a gazillion questions, of course, and he took the time to answer each one diligently, stating more than once, "There are never too many questions.". Simply put, this guy has a lot of insight, and it is evident he cares deeply about his craft.

I was not expecting to have the work completed that evening since the shop closes at 7PM, and the work I wanted done was estimated at 1.5 hours. But, Chris said in so many words, "I'm good. Let's do this!". So we did.

I ran out to grab some sugar inducing food and beverage items while he prepped. Upon my return, he took an immense amount of care to make sure all was just right before we started.
Since I had not had such an extensive piece done before, he took time to explain to me how he would go about applying the ink, and advised to please let him know whenever I needed a break.
We then made a few, minor design changes, several tries at the stencil, and a little freehand drawing.... Voilà! It was perfect.

Three hours later, with only one short restroom break, my piece was complete, and I was elated. Even though it was late, and well past closing time, Chris (again) took the time to make sure I was comfortable with aftercare, and to answer any additional questions I had.

Throughout the entire process, I never felt rushed or disregarded in any way, and I truly enjoyed conversing with Chris.
Hey, if you're going to get poked with a needle for several hours by a total stranger, this is the guy to hire!

TIP: The drive to the right of the house leads to additional parking.

Laura and Mike are the best!

Laura has been doing my tattoos since 2008, when I lived in New York and would plan trips to visit my family in Nashville AROUND our sessions. Her color work is as fantastic as it gets, but her artistry is even more impressive. I have a certain style of line-work that I like for all of my tattoos, and she has the uncanny ability to match just my style, even before she'd ever tattooed me or seen any of my pieces! She will be doing an Americana-style classic piece and turn around and draw the more intricate, feminine lines I prefer without any hint of the previous style's influence.

If you're in Nashville (or not!) and looking for professional artists, go to Music City. They both have been tattooing for many MANY years and have so much experience under their belt, so you never feel like you're their "first" anything. They also are such joys to be around you want to get a tattoo just to hang out with them! Simply the greatest tattooing experience :)