World, meet Tish Melton: 17-year-old singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist who wears her incredibly perceptive heart on her sleeve. 

Melton chronicles teenage relationships – from the lonely pain of first love, unrequited love, friend crushes, joyous friendships, and the pain, fear and excitement of becoming an adult. She tells these stories as she’s living them, with a sharp eye for detail and lyricism that brings them to life. 

For her debut EP (coming 2024), she has teamed up with nine-time GRAMMY® Award-winning artist Brandi Carlile, who is a mentor to Melton and joins as producer. Their musical chemistry is undeniable, rooted in mutual respect, shared taste, and an appreciation for good songwriting and musical catharsis.  

When Tish was 16, she played an acoustic set at LA’s famed venue the Troubadour (where Joni Mitchell, Elton John and Carole King have all performed). Her performance was bookended by 5-person noisy bands, and she was nervous to go up on stage, alone with just her guitar. Her set hushed the entire room. A video of that performance made its way to Brandi, who instantly saw a familiar spark in Tish. Someone who was destined to sing her stories and could silence a room with them. 

Meanwhile, Tish had been making music in her bedroom for years. She got her first guitar at age 14 and spent the pandemic learning the songs of Taylor Swift and Lucy Dacus, whose clear-eyed storytelling and straightforward indie-rock sounds (respectively) she admires. She started writing her own songs (and re-writing, and re-working). “As a songwriter, I’ve realized you can just tell stories,” she says. “They don’t have to be big, dramatic moments. Personally, I learned how to write songs by simply sharing my journey and feeling how I naturally do.”

Those songs made their way to Carlile whose suspicion was confirmed – this girl has it – and she offered to produce. Together, they recorded what would become the EP during sessions in Brandi’s Seattle studio and at Shangri-La Studios in Malibu. 

Says Carlile, “Tish is so young and so brilliant. Like most lessons in life, I learned this one while I thought I was teaching it. We should guide youth in music but there’s no question that it should lead. My favorite thing was excitedly trying to explain that all the ‘new sounds’ Tish was into were actually the sounds of my city (Seattle) when I was exactly her age. A wonderful artist can plug you back into past parts of yourself you maybe should’ve stayed connected to?”

[The EP] opens with “The Chase,” which Melton describes as “angsty and petty and teenage at its core, pretty much an ode to someone who doesn’t care enough to return your calls or return your affection.” The song is propelled by electric guitar, which Brandi and Tish muffled to make it sound messy, just like teenage breakups. The lines are funny and brutal “you still call yourself a blond / you got a thing for holding on / but you let go of you when you let go of me / and your hair’s been brown since you were 13.” 

Melton explores the unrequited friendship on debut single “Michelle,” with layered doubled vocals that represent two versions of the narrator trying to win someone over. FLOOD Magazine compared her vocals to the cool Americana of Neko Case in their review of the track, while V Magazine praised her “vocal talent and introspective ability to be wise beyond her years.” 

Melton wrote “Long Drive,” the EP’s centerpiece, while pulled over on the side of the PCH after a sudden wave of complicated emotions overtook her about growing up, the nostalgia of being a kid, and the fear of what’s to come. Melton’s ability to rip a feeling from the air and put it into song is evident here. The song builds and builds, with harmonies and spoken word added from Carlile, crescendoing into an emotional peak that anyone who has ever grown up will relate to. 

“Damage” is a heartbreaking song with a crystalline piano melody about pouring your heart into a first love, and realizing you’re alone in that feeling. “I wrote Damage when I was in a really bad place – I was confused and disoriented, obsessed with someone who couldn’t give me what I wanted and willing to be treated in any way for just a little bit of their time.” Melton recorded her vocals in the studio while extremely sick, but instead of scrapping those takes, they kept them as they conveyed a vulnerable, soft desperation in Tish’s higher registers… “dance around, dance around the kitchen / take it all but take it with a grain of salt / take me for granted i’ve planned it i’m equipped to handle your damage” she sings, as piano twinkles around her. 

The EP finishes with “Sober” an emotional, extended rock-out ode to her friends and a wish to stay clear-eyed to keep their memories intact as they prepare for adulthood. Melton’s vocals soar with lush harmonies over strumming guitar, punctuating piano and propulsive percussion. “When I listen to this song, I think about sleepovers and dinners and late-night conversations – I think about the experiences that I still remember vividly and that made me who I am. The speaking at the end is me introducing myself to the world through a poem, and Brandi responding with lyrics from one of her favorite musicians – you can figure that out if you’d like.” 

That give and take between Brandi and Tish sums it up. Melton introducing herself, stepping into her sound, but buoyed by a trusted mentor handing down lyrics from another musical hero.  

More about Tish Melton: 

Born in Northern Virginia, Tish Melton primarily grew up in Florida as the middle child of three siblings. Raised by a blended family, she credited her two moms and dad for “passing the writing gene down.” Her moms are author Glennon Doyle, acclaimed New York Times best-selling author of Untamed, and Abby Wambach, soccer icon, speaker and also a New York Times best-selling author. 

Participating in choir throughout her childhood, Melton always loved music, but she wholeheartedly embraced it at 14-years-old upon receiving a guitar from one of her moms. Obsessed with the instrument, she took lessons via Zoom throughout the pandemic and wrote at a feverish pace. She learned how to play favorites such as Taylor Swift’s “Fifteen” and the entirety of Lucy Dacus’s Home Video album. Influenced by the simplicity of the latter’s approach, she carefully developed a style of her own centered around storytelling with accents of pop, indie rock, and folk.