Last year, fans online began to wonder what happened to
Tink: it had been
16 months since the
22-year-old had dropped her last mixtape, and
6 months since she'd dropped off of social media completely. Then, in
December 2017, she returned to Instagram with a selfie and a declaration. In the photo, she stands confidently in front of a full-length mirror, wearing bronze heels, a denim skirt, and a mint green top. “
You’re beautiful. You’re gifted. You’re strong. You’re courageous. You’re powerful. You’re loved,” she wrote in the caption.
“Your story is yours for a reason! Only you can dictate the next chapter.” At the end of the message, she wrote the hashtagged phrase, “
#freeAtLast.” By the time she finished high school in
2014, the
Chicago native had already put out
five mixtapes, each an increasingly promising display of her talents as both a singer and a rapper. But since signing a joint deal with
Timbaland’s Mosley Music Group and
Epic Records the same year,
Tink’s releases have been few and far between: two
2015 singles that were meant to be a part of her delayed debut album,
two mixtapes that she financed and released on her own with no label backing or promotion, and a handful of loose tracks and collaborations.
*thefader.com
