Trope Based Bio – Matthew Sweet

Matthew Sweet provides examples of the following tropes:

  • The Cover Changes the Meaning: “Beware My Love” by Wings is sung from the viewpoint of a jilted lover warning that his replacement will mistreat the woman he’s leaving while the narrator in Sweet’s version is an abusive lover apologizing for his misdeeds.
  • Cover Version: He contributed a cover of “Scooby-Doo, Where Are You?” to the tribute album Saturday Morning: Cartoons’ Greatest Hits (the same album with The Ramones‘ breakneck cover of “Spider-Man”, incidentally).
  • Creator Breakdown:
    • GirlfriendAltered Beast and even 100% Fun, judging by some of the lyrics.
    • The audio clip from Caligula in the middle of Altered Beast would also seem to be a sign of this.
  • Darker and EdgierAltered Beast
  • Engrish: The title of Kimi Ga Suki is an inverse of this. As Sweet explains in the album’s liner notes: “If I did it correctly, the title should seem a little strange or wrong, but still meaningful! The true definition is supposed to be a ‘love you’ life, one devoted to loving someone or something, even life itself!”
  • Epic Rocking: “Thunderstorm”.
  • Fake-Out Fade-Out: “Divine Intervention”.
  • Longest Song Goes Last: At least three uses – In Reverse ends with 9:37 “Thunderstorm,” 100% Fun ends with 4:13 “Smog Moon,” and Sunshine Lies ends with 5:07 “Back of My Mind.” Inverted with Girlfriend, which put its longest track, “Divine Intervention” at 5:37, first.
  • Lyrical Dissonance: “Sick of Myself”.
  • Religion Rant Song: “Divine Intervention” isn’t as angry as XTC‘s “Dear God”, but it does pull a Holding Out for a Hero on God (the chorus goes We’re all counting on his/divine intervention) and voices doubts about his benevolence (Now does He love us?/I look around/And all I see is destruction).
  • Spoken Word in Music: “Intro,” from Altered Beast is a clip of dialogue from the film Caligula.
  • “Untitled” Title: “Untitled,” from In Reverse, works the word into the lyrics.

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Music/MatthewSweet