Meet Evann McIntosh, the school drop-out making music about life and love like nobody else
Welcome to CHEW THE FAT WITH…, our long-form profile series where we invite you to sit down with fashion’s next generation as they dig deep into their memories. To chew some fat - defined as an informal conversation brimming with small talk - we encourage you to pull up a chair and take a big old bite as we spill the tea on the life and work of the industry’s need-to-knows. Just remember to mop up after yourself.
The people that know the most about love aren't adults, they’re teenagers. A 14-year-old BILLIE EILISH gave us Ocean Eyes - possibly one of the last decade’s most distinguishable love songs around - before she could legally drive, drink, vote or smoke. And this year’s Sour by OLIVIA RODRIGO is perhaps the most seismic, relatable, far-reaching album to come about for years. Although 24-years-old, I wake up each morning and spend the first moments of my day deciding which song from Rodrigo’s debut album I feel best suits my mood before listening to nothing but that track for 12 hours straight. I’m never deterred knowing that it’s an 18-year-old blasting through my headphones, telling me more about love than I’ll ever be able to verbalise. It’s what they do, and they do it best.
Now, 17-year-old EVANN MCINTOSH is playing their part in shading in what’s left to say about love.
The musician joins me over Zoom from their bedroom in Kansas. Imagine your typical teenager’s room and it’s pretty much that. Sneakers are stacked high, posters taped to the walls, and McIntosh is propped up in front of it all. They’re distinguishably cool. Far more so than most of us could say at that age. Each answer is wrapped up with a brief “yeah” and a slight nod of the head, just to let me know that they’re finished answering my question. They say they spend most of their time “wasting gas” driving around in their car, and frequently coming to a head with adults that don’t quite understand them. And in between rehearsing for a tour and writing new music, McIntosh is trying to soak up a bit more culture than what Kansas can provide.
“I’ve been trying to watch movies and read books so that I’m absorbing stuff,” they say. “My life’s kind of boring now. Yeah.”
A recent video on McIntosh’s TikTok says that one thing that they will miss most about being a teenager is using it as an excuse to do irresponsible stuff. And for McIntosh, being a bit irresponsible comes in the form of biting back at the people they clash with. “I just get into fights with older people all the time,” they explain. “Because I like, dropped out of school and stuff. When I was in school, I couldn’t get through the whole day without getting into an argument with some grown ass woman. Yeah.”
Now free from the shackles of nagging adults, McIntosh has been focussing on nothing but their career - they recently dropped out of school to focus on music. And, surprisingly, their family were pretty accepting of the idea. McIntosh had been signed to a record label and was quickly building a solid international fanbase.
Much like Rodrigo and Eilish, their music is for everyone. Mcintosh might be a queer artist wanting to provide something relatable for other queer kids to listen to, but you can be anyone and listen to one of their tracks and feel almost intrusively seen. Again, as a 24-year-old (albeit, queer) man, I’ve shed a tear or two to more of McIntosh’s tracks than I care to mention, namely, Yours, Nobody Else, What Dreams Are Made Of, Aren’t You Lovely...I’ll stop there.
It will never cease to baffle audiences how someone of only 17 years of age can write so astutely about love and their experiences with the fleeting, pounding emotions that come with it. But McIntosh is a testament to how it’s done. Not only that, it comes naturally to the musician; an outlet, or even a language that feels more suited to talking about the experiences that McIntosh has had so far in life. “I just think, when you feel something so much that you just have to get it out of your system,” they say. “That’s what music is to me. And I can convert this feeling that I feel into music that anybody else can feel. It’s like a direct line of communication. What I can’t put into words, I can create an emotion for in song format. And I think that’s pretty cool. Yeah.”
“I think more so it's been an outlet for me. I think I had a lot of experiences up to this point that were not at all made to be digestible for somebody so young. I think music really helped with outletting trauma or thoughts I didn't understand. In that way, music’s always been like a support for me. I’m really lucky in being able to have that and be able to make some sort of career out of that. I’m kind of set in that way because it’s like all of me is in one place. Yeah.”
Other than their music career, McIntosh takes little too seriously, which is how they stay mentally afloat throughout life’s turbulence. Social media for the artist has played one of the biggest parts in getting their career to where it is today, but it’s also been a world that has had to be navigated with all of its potential detriments in mind. “I don’t take it seriously, and then I don’t have to find a balance,” they explain. “Not to invalidate anybody who has problems with Instagram and social media, but for me what I do to cope is just don’t take it seriously. A rule of mine is to never take the internet seriously and then it can’t hurt you, you know.”
“I have four golden rules or whatever. And I don’t remember any of them. But one of them is: don’t take anything seriously,” they say enthusiastically.
Evann McIntosh seems to have come far for someone not taking things too seriously. At the time of our call, Mcintosh is gearing up to release their upcoming EP, Character Development. It’s a project that McIntosh feels is a step up; a sequel to the prequel of everything that they’re capable of. Their first project, Mojo, explored McIntosh’s experience of being a young, queer person in Kansas or, as they put it, “being fluid in a place that seems so solid”. But Character Development shows McIntosh realising their situation and then breaking out of it; a body of work that no doubt highlights McIntosh’s talent in exploring the emotions that embody all of us, but also of what makes Evann, Evann.
And if there’s one more thing that Evann McIntosh does take seriously, it’s wanting to put out music that resonates. “I just hope that they can relate to it,” they conclude. “Because that’s probably the most positive thing that you can take away from music and that’s what music is, it’s how much you feel it. I think that if somebody can listen to it and really feel it, and feel heard or seen or just to have something to hold onto for a while for comfort. I feel like that’s the best thing someone can take away from my music.”
Evann McIntosh’s latest EP, Character Development, is now available to stream on Spotify and Apple Music.
Welcome to CHEW THE FAT WITH…, our long-form series where we invite you to sit down with fashion’s next generation as they dig deep into their memories. To chew some fat - an informal conversation brimming with small talk - we encourage you to pull up a chair and take a big old bite as we spill the tea on the life and work of the industry’s need-to-knows. Just remember to mop up after yourself.