Presley Tennant Asks for the Unthinkable on New Single 'Break My Heart': 'You Do Learn from Everything'
Presley Tennant loves being in love.
"I don't care what happens as long as I'm with him," the 20-year-old singer/songwriter tells PEOPLE of her year-and-a-half-long relationship with Jared Thornton, also 20. "It's really nice to have a person that is always there for me."
They met on Valentine's Day in the middle of the desert in their home state of California, and ever since, they have found a haven in each other's arms. But Tennant says she realizes that fairy tales often have some scary chapters, and she's completely fine with that.
"As far as I'm concerned, he could break my heart over and over again, and I'd probably be OK with that," she admits with a chuckle. "I don't want anybody else."
RAUL ESPARZA Presley Tennant
Tennant's new single "Break My Heart," which she co-wrote just over a year ago alongside Bobby McLamb and Nick Autry, touches on this sweet idea that love is always worth it.
"It's about that feeling of wanting to be with somebody and being willing to put everything into it," says Tennant, who broke out as a teen on the country music scene when she landed herself a slot as a finalist on Season 16 of The Voice. "And even if there is a chance that that person could break your heart over and over again, you still want to have that opportunity to be with them."
Tennant certainly serves up a rather mature look at a complicated topic.
"So many people are afraid of taking that chance and taking that risk because they don't want to be the person with their heart broke," she says. "They don't want to put themselves through it. But sometimes it is good to go through it because you do learn from everything."
Bringing a little more of the California country that artists such as Jon Pardi, Cam and Brett Young have already brought to the game, Tennant grew up in Norco, California, otherwise known as 'Horsetown USA.'
RAUL ESPARZA Presley Tennant
"I grew up around surrounded by horses and country music," says Tennant, who has spent the last year opening for artists such as Tim McGraw, Blake Shelton and Carly Pearce. "[Norco] is a very small town and everyone knows everybody. I feel like this is the place that really developed into what my sound is and who I am as a person."
Recently, Tennant went viral with her re-imagined cover of the Zach Bryan hit "Something in the Orange."
"I remember I was flying home from Nashville and literally right before I got on the plane, Zach Bryan had released his new album," Tennant remembers. "I was obsessed with this song. He's singing about this girl that is never coming back. And so, I wanted to change the perspective a bit and assume that she is coming back and that he's just reading the situation wrong. I just wanted to have a little different take on it."
RAUL ESPARZA Presley Tennant
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And it's this perspective that is really hitting for Tennant's growing fanbase.
"I feel like a lot of people resonated with it, which took me by complete surprise," Tennant says of the viral "Something in the Orange" video that she recorded from her backyard. "At first, it just was this fun thing that I was doing. But then when I put it out there, it just kind of blew up!" She laughs. "It's fun for me to reimagine a song."
From reimagination to turning the traditional love story on its head, Tennant is quickly proving that she is a wild card in the country music industry right now, ready, and willing to serve up lyrics like, 'I want you to break my heart/keep every piece when it falls apart/ long as you put it back together.'
"I will say that 'Break My Heart' is probably one of my favorite songs because of that exact lyric," she concludes. "I love it."
