The Wild West Of Weird TikTok Lives: The Top 5 Strangest Ones We Found
This article was written by The Zillennial Zine’s fall editorial intern Celeste MacMurray. Find her on Instagram at @clsmsanchezx. If you would like to share an article with The Zillennial, send us an email at thezillennialzine@gmail.com.
TikTok lives have gotten weirder lately. Not that they never were before, but recently there’s been an uptick in activity and with how strange they can get. If you’ve been on any corner of the Internet lately, you’ve probably become aware of the AI TikTok lives where the person, essentially, acts like an AI or NPC receiving commands, something we’ve covered here on The Zillennial Zine. In response to the way creator Pinkydoll’s lives trended, many took to doing the same or making their own version of it. However, the AI/NPC TikTok lives are only the tip of the iceberg of TikTok lives. It can get weirder than that.
While casually scrolling on the app, I have seen a wide assortment of TikTok lives recommended to me, some of which are actually quite normal. People doing their makeup for a GRWM, livestreams aimed to sell their products, different style ASMR videos, debates, cooking and so on and so forth. There are many kinds of TikTok lives you can find, and some are pretty commonplace. Yet, that’s never stopped me from coming across weird ones. From people laying in bed screaming to people dancing for hours, they can get a little strange, and this was my attempt to see how many weird ones I could find while scrolling.
So, in my attempts to conduct an experiment, I chose a method that I don’t recommend to anyone as I don’t want to promote any unhealthy sleeping schedules. I decided to stay up until 3 A.M. to scroll through TikTok to find the weirdest lives airing. Is my reasoning backed by science? No. Did I regret it the following day? Yes. There is literally no scientific or algorithmic evidence to support specifically choosing 3 A.M. as the time to search for weird TikTok lives, but really just because I thought I would find a gold mine. Usually my FYP tends to get a little weird around 3 to 4 A.M., so I thought the same might apply to TikTok lives as well.
I set off into the TikTok wilderness just as planned at 3 A.M. to scour the app for any sign of weird lives. I scrolled, I joined different lives, checked the explore tab, but I still couldn’t find what I was looking for. Most of the lives were various forms of ASMR, gaming, chatting, safe spaces for venting, but nothing truly interesting. It seemed like the one day I needed my FYP to get a little weird was the one day it couldn’t deliver.
I was starting to despair, worrying that my research for this article would amount to nothing. I was afraid this article would produce me no results, but I couldn’t give up. I decided to continue my search into the wee hours of the night. It was close to 4 A.M. when I decided to lay my phone down for a moment to rest my eyes. And then I woke up at 7 A.M., meaning I had fallen asleep, failed my hypothesis and that it was time to start my day.
So what did I learn?
I learned that weird lives don’t necessarily happen late at night and that you can find them at any time throughout the day. Turns out that you can find these lives at reasonable times in the evening, mostly between the hours of 6 and 9 P.M., so please don’t stay up late like me. I’ve talked a lot about my methods and my madness, so it’s time I talk about the weirdest TikTok lives I found.
Saxsquatch
Under the username Saxsquatch, this creator goes on live and plays the saxophone while in a full-body sasquatch suit. The space they play in has an outdoors backdrop with a functioning fog machine as they serenade their listeners. The creator plays a wide variety of musical selections across genres, from oldies to current pop hits. Coincidentally enough, when I joined the livestream they were covering “Never Gonna Give You Up” by Rick Astley, so, yes, I got Rick-rolled by Saxsquatch. Upon further research, I’ve also found out that they are currently doing a tour across the U.S. to play covers and original songs.
Disturb My Job
If you search “disturb my job” on TikTok, you’ll find a variety of screen recordings showing you what these lives are usually like. Typically you will see a man sitting at a desk while they presumably do their work with a sign detailing all the different actions they’ll do depending on the TikTok gifts they receive. Some of these include dancing, setting off a fog machine, putting on a mask to dance and other weird displays that will disrupt the person’s job. In the live I watched, the man at his desk was sent a doughnut gift, which meant he had to get up and dance “Gangnam Style.” The thing is, you can find multiple different lives just like these from different people, but they’re all quite similar. Oftentimes they act stressed and like they are crying from the constant sound effects caused by the gifts they’re sent, or they have sad face filters on the whole time. In some ways it’s a little uncanny at times. If you’re curious about what these lives are typically like, here’s an example above.
Wake Up
This live was actually pretty strange and off-putting, to be honest. It featured two girls laying down on the floor pretending to be asleep with only a small blanket. There was a poster behind them that showed the different sound effects that would play or the actions they would do depending on the gifts sent. Some sounds include a trumpet, a dance they have to do or an audio shouting “wake up!” After I found this live, I started getting recommended others just like it, but with different people and on different accounts. However, they all followed a similar formula and style that was obviously being replicated. I can no longer find the original account of the live I saw, but here is a TikTok that can give you an example of what it was like.
What’s strangest to me about these lives is the concept behind them. Who is making these lives? What is the incentive? What do they hope to achieve? Is it solely for revenue? Besides the straight-up odd nature of them, what’s most puzzling about them to me is their purpose.
Egg ASMR
This is actually one of the few lives I happened to come across while scrolling during my night experiment. This live was ran by halinton.asmr, and the creator who made it had on a filter that put their face inside a sunny side up egg while they did ASMR. It mainly included whispering and mouth noises type of ASMR, which may or may not be your cup of tea as it certainly isn’t mine. It wasn’t that overtly chaotic or strange, but it was a little wacky with the egg filter.
You’re In Detention
This live, I think, is the most interesting one I came across. Essentially, the creator, mrburgies, who ran the live was hosting a virtual detention, and every action the viewers made determined the length of it. There was a set of rules on screen and a timer set to countdown from 26 hours—the time which detention was meant to last.
If any viewers sent on-screen gifts that do animations across the screen, they would swiftly be yelled at by the creator and different amounts of time would be added to the timer to extend the length of detention. Someone even left a comment asking if they could take a nap, which prompted the creator to scold them and added a few more hours to the timer.
These are only some of the few strange TikTok lives I could find, but I’m sure there are more out there I’ve yet to discover.
Are you a frequent watcher of TikTok lives? What do you think of them? Do you know of any weird lives on TikTok? Tell us all about any favorite accounts you like to watch go live or any strange ones you’ve come across!