Why is TikTok so hot for Matty Healy?

“Mattie Healy is a community resource,” my friend Mel (who changed her name to protect her dignity) says of the lead singer of British band The 1975.

We spoke over the phone to Healy, a man she “actively didn’t care about” when she accompanied the band’s show at Madison Square Garden in November, recently had a totally unintentional descent into it. Mel was exercising politely in the first half, but felt sick when Healy nibbled on a raw steak. Then he snuck into TV blaring with images of Ben Shapiro, Logan Paul, his NFTs at the Bored Ape Yacht Club, and Zuckerberg’s metaverse. Her commentary on her online radicalization, male chauvinism, and modernity was a little too damning for her. She left the arena indifferent to Healy and the band. “Really, I didn’t feel any kind,” she shrugged.

Within two weeks, TikTok’s thirsty Matty Healy created a For You page with a horny chokehold. She was barraged with clips of Healy’s onstage antics – eating meat, stabbing on camera, spitting on fans, and more. decipherment with them (consent) — from the group’s more than 20 North American tour dates. One particular genre saw Healy do crowd work and chastise security guards with Auto-Tune. These videos have garnered millions of views on both TikTok and his Twitter, making his name trending regularly over the past two months. The group incorporates a sizable fan base in his 20s who discovered them on Tumblr between 2012 and 2015, but the reach of these videos extends beyond them. It extended to people like

Mel believes TikTok’s algorithm focused on “people who were on Harry Styles’ TikTok.” She theorized when The 1975 began touring around the same time.

She told me she had to talk about the “infamous clip.” “You know the clip I’m talking about.” She doesn’t know which clip she’s talking about. The band’s gig at Corona Capital in Mexico City on November 20 proved relatively unremarkable by Healy’s standards. Call me when you’re playing by yourself,” sings.

The video spawned hundreds of breathtaking reaction videos from adult women. The top comment reads, “Mattie is an original woman’s point of view.” “The appeal of Matty Healy is that he’s slutty and everyone feels like they can pull him off. Just wait 15 minutes at the coffee shop,” explains Mel. Between the overt flirting, “he feels approachable enough.”

In contrast, TikTok users have fashioned him as a soft indie boyfriend who is a “very baby girl” (a loving but slightly childish term). A comment about Healy’s particularly light performance, accompanied by a .

The attraction to Healy usually coexists with the looming threat of complete repulsion. “This guy is always within an inch of giving me sickness,” says Mel. I want to be friends with you, but you’re so small.'”

A TikTok video was also made to address that contradiction, with Demi Lovato saying, “I love this guy, and I gotta have him.

And of course, many people are puzzled by Healy’s game. There’s an entire cadre of TikTok videos of women showing their boyfriends “playing with themselves” clips of Matty Healy, leaving their partners looking disgusted or unimpressed.

“My boyfriend is actually a fan of the band, but he doesn’t 100% ‘understand’ Matty, even though he likes their music and wants to see them live.” I’ve been a fan of this band for years, and found them after seeing them open with another band in 2013. He said that ‘Chocolate’ sold on iTunes for 69 cents. We found them around the same time when it was the song for .” She has stated that her boyfriend, Rich, “would describe Matty as a kidney bean/mouse.” washed away People who think they’re cooler than they actually are,” Susie added, adding, “For the record, I disagree. In fact, I think Matty is cool.”

But no matter how perilously he lurches, Healy is mostly saved by how acutely aware of the stories around his actions and how much he enjoys engaging with them. increase. It’s all playful and done with a wink and a knowing smile. He posted a fan meme on Instagram, yelling, “I’m a sex symbol!” At a show in Minneapolis. He wears a sweatshirt that says “Matt Healy is a Mouse” in public. funny things in foreign languagesasks, “Did you wake up with the butt of a joke, ironically?”

“The whole conversation ‘Do you know you’re a rock star? Do you accept that you’re a rock star? Are you okay with that?’ It’s been going on since the album,” Healy said in a recent interview. variety.[Being Funny in a Foreign Language ] It felt like I was watching something, witnessing something…a near-perfect extension of its underlying theme.

When boyfriend grimaces at his dance or outlet Guardian Respond to consensual on-stage reconciliation sessions with fans with headlines such as “Spooky Behavior or Pop Performance?” They miss the point.Healy hope to be perceived. “Everything is a statement to him,” Mel says. Matty Healy has never noticed. “

The man is having fun and wreaking havoc, for your profit and your bait. “He’s basically asking us, ‘What do you want me to be?’ is also excellent.