Khakikid: I got to fully experience Cork city, at the jazzfestival, and it was like, this is great

Beneath his luscious curly locks and super chill demeanour there is an unexpected level of discipline to Khakikid. Even though I catch him in his kitchen of a Monday morning exuding relaxed and languid vibes I am interested to find I am impinging on a strictly allocated portion of time.

“Mondays are a girlfriend day for me,” Abdu Huss breezily explains. “I’m pretty busy the rest of the week, so Monday I have to lock it in for my girl and not do any work.”

Does she know about this, I enquire of our zoom appointment?

“She’s out walking the dog, so we’ll be alright,” he assures with a gesture that allays any misgivings I may have of intruding on this time. Of course, it’s not like they don’t see each other outside of Monday. Besides, “she’s a busy person as well,” he adds. “She has her own business.”

Outside of Mondays, Abdu spends his week writing songs, recording videos and designing merch. You suspect, however, that he’s thinking about ideas for songs all of the time, even on Mondays. Chance favours the prepared mind, and Abdu’s is always open to tasty lyrical morsels.

“I have a list on my phone,” he illustrates. “It could be like sentences or singular words. The folder is called ‘Song Ideas’, and if anyone ever says anything of interest to me or I see anything interesting, or just in a casual conversation if someone uses a turn of phrase that I quite like, I’ll write it down, and then usually when I go to start a song, if I don’t have an immediate idea I’ll go to that list. There’s usually plenty of ideas.

“Like my girlfriend’s friend the other day, when she met the dog for the first time, she said: ‘if I had tears I’d be crying.’ And I was like, for some reason that sounds poetic. I don’t know why it sounds poetic, but I was like, that could be a song idea. But yeah, essentially, I go to the list.”

I better look out for that one in a future recording.

“100%,” he smiles. “I’ve already used it, to be honest.”

Like most people, my point of introduction to Khakikid was the song “Date Night”. However, it was well after the track had been viewed some 20 million times, and I tell Abdu, with some degree of sheepishness, that my first encounter with him was through his effortless performance of the track on The Late Late Show. This raises a chuckle,

“It’s great to hear from you, because I haven’t specifically talked to anyone directly who said they saw me on the Late Late.”

Of course not. You hang around with young people your age.

“You know what! That song definitely expanded my audience’s age, younger and older. It was strange. People have been sending me videos of their kids, or their nieces or their nephews singing the song. And then, there might be someone’s mother or father or even grandmother singing the song. That’s so strange seeing the age groups expand both ways.”

He’s not wrong. Amongst his YouTube comments are messages from older fans cheerfully proclaiming their “aul one” love for his music. And while he’s warming to the idea of his broad appeal, it doesn’t look like he’s too tolerant of people his age acting like aul ones, if the line “If you’re in your 20s talking about back then, bitch, reminisce over there!” from “Don’t Touch the CDJ” is anything to go by.

So, when is the cut-off age when it’s ok to start looking back?

“I found myself doing it,” he happily admits. “But I felt like reminiscing is fun, but at the same time the now is exciting. Reminiscing is nice to do every now and again, but I feel like you’re alive now, you should be living now. I don’t know if you ever meet people and all they talk about is back in school or back in this time of my life, or this time of my life, and it’s like you’re living right now, you know.”

It also goes back to being open to lyrical inspiration.

“I just know that being present creates better music,” he insists, “because all these phrases people are saying to me and all these song ideas that I write down are from being aware. You know, if I see an old lady riding past on a bike holding flowers, that might be a song idea and if I had my head down I wouldn’t have been aware of her, you know.

“And then, like, the ‘to be ex-boyfriend is scared of any kid over six in a tracksuit’ [from ‘Date Night’]. Again, that’s just something in conversation I had with somebody. If we were talking about back-in-the-day I wouldn’t have heard that line or that concept. But yeah, being present is something I’m working on at the moment.”

Being in the moment is also something the Walkinstown alt-rapper demonstrates in his live appearances, where he manages to generate a lot of energy.

“It can get a bit hectic, a bit more energetic,” he agrees.” And when there’s a bit more space I tend to run around a lot, maybe get into the crowd. I just love to be involved in the shows.”

It will be interesting to see if he can pull that off at St. Luke’s Church, with its higher stage and fixed pews.

“We’ll figure it out,” he says.

The kid is looking forward to returning to Cork having played a gig here for the first time at last year’s festival when he was performing with jazz-tinged hip-hoppers Bricknasty at the Opera House.

“That was incredible,” he recalls, “and then I realised Cork is actually a great place to play, and it was a great vibe.”

You see, up until then, Abdu’s experience of Cork had been a negative one. In his time playing basketball for Templeogue, his visits to the city were chastening experiences.

I used to play basketball growing up, and our goal as a team was to beat Neptune

“I used to play basketball growing up and my only experience of Cork was playing against our rival team,” he recalls. “My whole basketball career for like five years, our goal as a team weas to beat Neptune. And we, like, lost to them by one point. So, like, Cork in my head was grrrr,” he says in mock anguish.

“I’ve only been to the Parochial Hall and Neptune Stadium, so I didn’t experience Cork. So last year I got to fully experience it, and it was like, this is great.”

• Khakikid plays Live at St Luke’s on October 24 and 26. Doors 7.30pm.