There truly is no better way to commemorate a moment in time than by inking it into your body forever, and Katy Perry does exactly that. Ever since 2009, the singer returns from every tour with a new tattoo. With her Las Vegas residency “Play” coming to a close after two years, it was time for her to add another one.
On Friday, Perry shared a video of herself getting tattooed by artist Liz Kim on her Instagram story. “You guys know what it is? I bet you can’t guess what I’m getting right now. I am getting my tour tattooed, it’s a tradition,” she says in the clip.
On the next story, she posted a picture of the fresh ink: a cartoonish drawing of a red and white mushroom on her finger. One of the singer’s costumes featured a red vinyl bodysuit with a matching mushroom headpiece, while at one point performing with singing and dancing mushrooms.
Yesterday, Perry shared another video on her Instagram page, captioned: “T-minus 7 shows until we’re leaving Las Vegas… and to commemorate the last 2 years of waking up in Vegas, me + 51 of my tour crew continued the tradition I started after my first Hello Katy tour, and got matching 🍄 tattoos”
In the video, Perry explains: “It’s a tradition. After we do a tour, I always bring a tattoo artist out to give the same tattoo that embodies the tour. It’s a little bit of a ritual, we all shed blood together.”
This is the singer’s fifth tattoo that celebrates a specific tour. She continues the video by showing her other tour tattoos, the first one being a cartoon strawberry from 2009 that she got in honor of her debut headlining tour, “The Hello Katy Tour.” In 2012, she got a cartoon peppermint candy for the “California Dreams” tour and in 2015 she got a cartoon prism for the “Prismatic World Tour.” The latest one before the mushroom was a Saturn tattoo for “Witness: The Tour” in 2018. And she’s not the only one with all the ink, her whole tour crew has gotten them matching throughout the years too.
Katy Perry’s tattoo collection doesn’t stop there, though. She also has “Jesus” tattooed on her wrist as well as a Hello Kitty head, a lotus flower, “XLIX” (in honor of her 2015 Superbowl halftime show) and many more. The singer is expected to continue touring after the end of her Vegas residency, so we’ll be on the lookout for even more tattoos in the future.
