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Lit - TV Tropes

  • ️Sun Oct 02 2011

Lit (Music)

Lit is an American alternative rock band from California that made several known singles between the late 1990's and early 2000's. Its founding members include: A.J. Popoff (vocals), Jeremy Popoff (lead guitar), Allen Shellenberger (drums), and Kevin Baldes (bass).

Discography

Studio albums

  • Tripping the Light Fantastic (1997)
  • A Place in the Sun (1999)
  • Atomic (2001)
  • Lit (2004)
  • The View from the Bottom (2012)
  • These Are the Days (2017)
  • Tastes Like Gold (2022)

Singles

Troping the Light Fantastic

  • Anti-Love Song: "Miserable", which is about the narrator falling out of love with his love interest.

    You make me come
    You make me complete
    You make me completely miserable

  • As Himself: When they appeared on Pamela Anderson's TV show V.I.P. they played themselves. The episode even featured several of their songs.
  • Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever:
  • Bowling for Ratings: The music video for "My Own Worst Enemy" takes place at the Java Lanes bowling alley in Long Beach, California, where the band members play against each other while other shots show them singing their performance.
  • Butt-Monkey: Despite the Gushing About Guest Stars that occurred in the episode, lead singer A.Jay Popoff wound up being this during Lit's guest spot on V.I.P.. Over the course of the episode he winds up stuck in his boxers because his pants were stolen, loses his lucky belt buckle twice and gets kidnapped at gunpoint by arms dealers. To top it all off, in the music video at the end of the episode he gets eaten alive by a giant version of Val.
  • Colossus Climb: Their most famous video features them exploring Pamela Anderson's body. In the video, Pam is portrayed as a bikini-clad giantess.
  • Cover Version: 2022's Tastes Like Gold concludes with their cover of "Let's Go" by The Cars.
  • Death by Music Video: Their video for "Miserable" features the band playing on a giant Pamela Anderson. For most of the video, Pam seems happy to let them perform and walk on her various body parts, but towards the end of the video, she suddenly turns on the band and starts hunting them down and swallowing them alive, starting with the bassist and one-by-one gobbling them up until finally devouring lead singer A.J. Popoff.
  • "Everybody Dies" Ending: "Miserable" ends with Pamela Anderson hunting down each of the band members and eating them alive, leaving no survivors.
  • Genre Shift:
    • Though mostly known as an Alt Rock group, in recent years they've experimented with other styles and have currently found success in country music, though they've since switched back to rock.
    • "Miserable" 's video starts out as the music video equivalent of a Jiggle Show, featuring Pamela Anderson as a giantess in a bikini, with lots of close-ups and slow, panning cheesecake shots of her body as the four guys climb all over it. Then the second she casually devours Kevin Baldes like a grape, the video turns from a male fantasy into a Psycho Sexual Horror, with extended sequences of the guys getting hunted down by Pam and special attention placed towards showing each one's frightened reaction right before she swallows him alive.
  • Giant Woman: The music video of "Miserable" features a giant version of Pamela Anderson hunting down the band and eating them all once they're captured one by one.
  • Gushing About Guest Stars: Their episode of V.I.P. featured its fair share of this, with the female members of VIP all fawning over them and Val being starstruck. Though Pam being a real life fan probably contributed. And the video played at the end subverts it by featuring Val as a Giant Woman who toys with the guys as she swallows them whole.
  • Hot Paint Job: Jeremy Popoff, the band's lead guitarist's Iconic Item(s) are a pair of shoes with white flames on them.
  • Hotter and Sexier: Miserable is this compared to their other music videos. While most of their videos aren’t without some eye candy here and there, they're usually just the four Lit boys goofing around in alter-egos in various, often silly, adventures. However, Miserable is heavy on the Fanservice, as it is entirely centered around a woman of enormous size posing around in a bikini and high heels while the four members, as themselves, walk all over her body and play music while the camera ogles the woman's body. Since the video ends with this giant bikini model chasing down and devouring the guys, it also counts as Darker and Edgier.
  • Mouth Screen: The lyric videos for "Mouth Shut" and "Kicked off the Plane" feature a close-up of a woman's mouth as she sings along. She also has on gold lipstick.
  • New Sound Album: "These are the Days" is country-oriented.
  • No Body Loves The Bassist: Kevin Baldes, the band's bassist, is the first one to get eaten in the music video for "Miserable".
  • One-Steve Limit: Previously subverted with their late original drummer, Allen Shellenberger, and lead vocalist A. Jay Popoff, whose first initial stands for Alan.
  • Sibling Team: Lead singer A. Jay Popoff and guitarist Jeremy Popoff are brothers. Jeremy is the older brother while A. Jay is the younger brother.
  • Those Two Guys: Brothers A. Jay and Jeremy Popoff are often seen together the most out of the four members, especially in interviews, and even toured as a duo for a brief period before reuniting with the rest of the band.
  • What Did I Do Last Night?: The premise of "My Own Worst Enemy" is about getting so black out drunk that the singer can't remember how his car wound up on his lawn, climbing through his window when he got locked out of his house, or the violent argument he had with his girlfriend that ended with her chucking something at his head and taking off.
  • While Rome Burns: The music video for "Over My Head" starts with the band performing in a nightclub while the Drej are attacking the earth.