Exclusive: One Direction Tattoo Artist Talks 'MSG' Ink


Another day, another fresh batch of tattoos for two of the guys in One Direction. That's right, the next time you see Zayn Malik and Louis Tomlinson you might want to keep a look out for those new tats.

On Thursday night, one night before they take the stage at Madison Square Garden for Z100's Jingle Ball, Malik got the letters "MSG" inscribed on his arm, paying homage to the famed NYC venue that they also played this past Monday. And when tattoo artist John Bahel spoke to MTV News on Friday, he shared that Tomlinson got something else-- but wouldn't divulge the details.

"They just gave me a buzz and I went down there. So [Zayn] was just super stoked on playing MSG and being in New York. He was just like super stoked that so many people came out, so many people came out from different areas of the world pretty much," he said of Malik's choice, playing coy about what Tomlinson got tattooed. "I'm pretty sure they don't want me talking about exactly what they got because that's on them. That's their personal thing, but I did not do 'MSG' on Louis."

Considering how much ink the guys already have, Bahel definitely went into tattooing them at the Trump Hotel with a game plan. Why? So that the new tats and the old ones would look attractive side by side.

"Well I go into and, of course, as an artist I want the tattoos on his arm to flow together," he explained. "And it's just how we do tattoos, we make sure that the arm flows together when it's done cause [Zayn] was talking about how he wants to get more tattoos and if you have too many clashing tattoos on your arm it doesn't look good. So you want to make sure the arm looks good as an art piece."

It seems that he's become tattoo besties with them, noting that he'd love to work with them again. So, does he know what he'd like to tattoo on them next? "Not really, whatever they want. I had fun tattooing them. It was a really fun time, sometimes I get clients that don't really talk, kind of stern. But they were really fun to tattoo," he said. "They were normal guys that like to have fun.

"They're super chill guys. They're not super snobby or anything like that," he added. "They're just like normal guys that like to talk about random things, just talk about normal things."

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