We all make mistakes in life, but the mistake Matthew Thomas made was so ridiculous that he ended up on TV.
The show was “America’s Worst Tattoo” on TLC, and you can guess where this is going. His tattoo was on his lower back, and he headed straight to South Jersey when he heard the show was filming so he could get it covered. It was so ugly that his ex-girlfriend actually thought it was Sonic the Hedgehog.
“I don’t know what inclined him at 19 years old to get that, but it was some drum and bass tattoo or something to do with jungle music,” said Jennifer Deery, his best friend. “But on the show, he’s laughing his ass off.”
Though he stopped getting horrible tattoos, his love of electronic music continued through his life. He spent hours creating unique sounds that no one had ever heard to make music that was very much his own style. The beats skewed toward jungle, but he was so talented he could mix that style with Adele and make it work, Jennifer said.
Thomas grew up in Williamstown, New Jersey, with a brother and his mother after his dad moved to California when he was little. His mom, Joyce, was a preschool teacher and at one point she had an ice cream shop.
Even as a young kid, Matt was teaching the other little ones how to draw. That love of art led him to get a bachelor’s in fine arts at the Philadelphia University of the Arts.
Besides making music, making art was his happy place. He was a bit of a recluse, Jennifer said, so he spent lots of time being creative. She estimated that he finished about 7,000 drawings and paintings in his life, much of which is hanging all over his mom’s house in Audubon.
“That was like his therapy,” Jennifer said. “Like, some people drink, some people smoke, he made art.” His style often included intricate mandalas, or spiraling geometric figures that are based in traditional Indian art.
Of course, making a living a making art isn’t easy for anyone, so he had been working as a contractor for several years. Much of the work involved clearing out houses for construction, and he and some coworkers were loading items into storage in Southwest Philly on Halloween 2022. Someone came up on the 2500 block of Carroll Street and shot him four times. He was 47.
Matt and Jennifer met in 2016 when she sold him a couch. They got to talking and basically became inseparable. She says many other people would have run away because of her challenges, which included cerebral palsy, but not Matt. He was that kind of soul with unlimited patience who knew how to care for people.
“I was messed up on methadone, and he was the reason I quit in 2018. We were really in tune with each other,” she said. “He was one of the best people I ever met. He saved my life there’s no doubt about it.”
Training to become a black belt in tae kwon do also gave him an inner strength to help others. And it kept him in shape so he could continue skateboarding into his 40s.
Jennifer wasn’t the only person to feel the benefit of his generous spirit. The two were walking through Wasington Square Park one day and came upon a homeless kid who didn’t have any shoes on. Matt had extra pair of boots in his bag, so he offered them. “And the kid says, ‘I really like sneakers you got on.’ So Matt took his sneakers off and gave them to him.”
Matt spent a lot of time with his mother, who is also taking the death quite hard. The two became even closer during the Covid lockdowns, and his loss has taken a devastating toll. Now Jennifer has stepped in to help care for her (she’s trying to raise money to help support her care on this GoFund Me page).
“She’s really going through it,” she said. “They were best friends. She leaned on him for everything, so now I’m helping out with his mom.”
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