Hailed as the self-proclaimed prodigal son of UD, ManLikeKofi remains a steadfast feature of the ecosystem, an artist, producer, and architect designing sonic cathedrals across digital platforms and through expert production. Driven by faith and the enduring power of practice, ManLikeKofi talks with Elsa Monteith about going viral with gospel, the importance of investing in a quality live performance, and what 10,000 hours of commitment to your artistry can bring you…
“What’s behind the name?” I ask ManLikeKofi – a three-word-no-space moniker that I’ve seen arise in different pockets of the internet over the past few years. “It’s distinguishing that I’m Black British African”, he shares, “The ‘man like’ is what we say here – UK colloquial – whereas ‘Kofi’ is a very distinctive Ghanaian name that means born on Friday. ‘ManLikeKofi’ brings the Black British and Ghanaian together.” It makes total sense, with his artist name feeling emblematic of a wider cohesion in his artistry beyond just his identity, a bringing-together of different sounds, genres, and emotions under one sonic umbrella; music of Black origin.
ManLikeKofi is a clear polymath – a qualified architect on the one hand, with the other designing musical landscapes with a not dissimilar planning process. His lyrical description of building sounds through samples, and visuals through his own lens of inspiration draws out a precision to his work that feels reminiscent to the exactitude needed to pen the design of a house. “It’s very rewarding when you have a sound in your head that you’re able to achieve and execute”, shares Kofi, a common language of design found in many elements of his practice. “It’s like when the possibility of the unknown comes out from a production process.”
With music comes faith for ManLikeKofi, brought up in a Christian household that he now shares with his wife and daughter, his track Three Times a Lady is a heartfelt dedication to the three most important women in his family; his wife, his mother, and his baby girl. The production, like all of his discography, is pure and lucid, a homage to his ancestry, family, and future all in the same deep breath.
ManLikeKofi’s upcoming project is set to be as far-reaching and resonant as his viral track Testimony is, a sample-driven success story that saw ManLikeKofi catapulted to high acclaim. 10,000 hours of practice are well underway, and there’s only more sonic joy to come.
Your musical journey spans genres like R&B, Soul, Jazz, Funk, Gospel, and Hip-Hop. How do you approach blending these diverse influences into a cohesive sound?
When people ask me, “what music do you do?” I always say, “I make an eclectic range of music of Black origin”. To some extent, I think every form of music comes from some root of music of Black origin.
There are such a range of influences that I’ve always grown up on. I was raised in a Christian household and my faith is really important to me, so my first introduction to music probably would have been Christian worship music. My late father was a Reverend, so back in the 90s, my parents would regularly get CDs sent to them by a famous Christian record label called Integrity Music. My dad had a massive record collection, and when he passed two years ago, I kept quite a bit of his record collection. There’s quite a range there, even though we’re Ghanaian by heritage, which is another context. I’m quite a sponge, sonically, it’s the things I’m picking up from loads of different places and I think that makes me who I am. I don’t like to be boxed into one particular sound.
The ‘Hunnid Squared Heures Series’ on YouTube showcases your versatility with covers and freestyles. What inspired you to start this series, and how has it influenced your growth as an artist?
I actually called my company that, because the whole idea of that is the Malcolm Gladwell principle of 10,000 hours. The idea was that I was putting in 10,000 hours to be able to practice piano and rapping, and to be able to grow as an artist.
When I got furloughed in 2020, it just allowed my brain to think. There’s something Dave Chappelle once said that goes; “I did something that not a lot of Black men in America have the ability and time to be able to do”, and the punch line was “just to think”. And that was it – I just had the space to think without having the pressure of these deadlines. It gave me some clarity as to what I could do, and so my wife and I were doing up our flat, and whilst my wife isn’t musical at all, she said she really wants our child to be able to play piano and have things that we didn’t have as children. And so we got a piano, and I just kept on practicing and I was enjoying it. I’m actually not that good at piano, I’m actually quite bad.
That doesn’t come across at all! It sounded really good.
That’s the beauty of practice. That’s the reason why it’s 10,000 hours. I would pick a song that I love, and a lot of those songs were songs that I loved and were really speaking to me at that time, like Black Truck by Mereba, and Free Mind by Tems coming out at the end of 2020. I think I only put in one song of my own, but it was the idea that I need to ensure that I’m practicing what I do as a pianist, and growing that skill and practicing my rap ability. So it would just be me freestyling and learning one song by piano a month.
As a self-produced artist, you handle everything from beat production to slick visuals. What are the challenges and rewards of maintaining this level of creative control over your sound and image?
Sometimes my ideas are bigger than the resources I have. I definitely feel like there’s a challenge in being able to keep up with the speed of things too, and sometimes feeling under-resourced in both time and money. But then the rewards are like learning a new skill or small fine-tuning, and creating that sound, especially when you have a sound in your head, that you’re able to achieve and execute. It’s very rewarding, when the possibility of the unknown comes out from a production process. Maybe you start with a sample or you start with a chord progression and something comes out of that. That’s such a beautiful feeling.
In February 2023, you embarked on a daily beatmaking and sampling challenge on social media, leading to viral moments and a significant increase in your TikTok following. How did this experience impact your creative process and audience engagement?
When I made that viral gospel beat, I didn’t actually think that much of it. That daily beatmaking series was to level up on my content ability, and that was more the challenge or the task that I was trying to achieve. I would release all these beats during the week that would have “secular” popular samples, but I then dedicated my Sundays to putting out gospel, and then bang, the first one I did was the one that went viral. That changed the trajectory of my music, because that became the demand. I just remember thinking wow, it’s actually a real privilege to be able to make music, because you’re just putting sounds and vibrations together. That’s it, you’re just putting sonics together and seeing how it will resonate with you and resonate with other people. It’s beautiful.
@man.like.kofi Bringing you straight #gospelflips for these Sundays… ⛪️ ????????✝️ For next week you want that #Unc#UncleKirk#Unc#UncleFred?ay#day005o#producers#musicp#hiphopa#beatsp#raps#musicproducer #djt#artistp#rappera#trapa#beatmakerw#newmusics#musiciang#logicxu#soundcloudn#singerv#loveo#producerlifea#beatu#studiou#youtubesMLKwooh ♬ original sound – ManLikeKofi
Do you feel like it changed your relationship with your audience?
I definitely found it intimidating, and I think I’m still slightly there because it’s like, how do I follow up? You start chasing virality again because, let’s face it, when you’re aspiring to make content or something along those lines full time, there are materialistic rewards associated a lot of the time with numbers and things. We commodify art somehow and that’s what happens with going viral. I think I definitely felt a sense of pressure, but it kind of just made me feel like I wanted to be a bit more tactical.
Performing at venues like Troy Bar and events like the Roundhouse Rising Festival has been part of your journey. How have these live performances contributed to your development as an artist?
I think a lot of new artists underestimate the importance of being able to put on a quality live show. You’re only going to refine that by developing a practice, and that’s kind of what going to the UD Open Mic’s is about for me. We’re really focused nowadays as a society on short form content as our gateway to these things, but when we think about how the music video used to work, they were created to further expand on the artist’s story and the world that they’re building. I think it’s important to be able to craft that and communicate that through your live show and live performance, because there’s a slightly different energy to it. I just like seeing the reaction in real time and the responses from people.
You’ve got to use quite a number of touch points to be able to allow people to see you and I think the live performance does that.
What’s your relationship like with UD as an organisation?
Before my undergrad, I went back to working at the London Borough of Newham, and funnily enough, got in contact with UD and started to volunteer around 2009. I used to take photos of their Industry Takeover events and things along those lines. It was a lot of fun, and I look back in hindsight and I’m like, oh wow, there were some really amazing things happening. There were some really amazing artists coming out of that time. I remember photographing Little Simz and just thinking this 13 year old girl is just smashing it!
In 2023 I was going through my emails and I saw an email from UD about Open Mic and I was like ‘oh yeah, this organisation that I used to volunteer with, I wonder what they’re doing now’, and I saw that they had a new facility (Talent House), and I just thought I want to check it out and see. I kept going to the Open Mic’s and performing as much as possible. What is really fantastic about what UD is also doing with these Open Mics, is that they allow artists to perform more than one song, and that allows people to see a little bit more of a body of work and a bit more of performance ability. I think that’s what happened in allowing me to get the opportunity to do the UD x HAUS Sessions event.
I’m so grateful to UD, I’ve been saying this throughout to a lot of people – I’m locked in with UD, I feel like I’m an honorary part of the Incubator Programme (laughs). They really are presenting me with quite a few opportunities to be able to just be in their ecosystem, and I really, really appreciate that and genuinely really grateful for it. It’s a motivator that says what you’re doing is good and people believe in what you’re doing, keep on going, don’t give up, don’t let your momentum get stifled.
Looking ahead, what new horizons are you excited to explore in your musical journey?
In the immediate, getting this sample cleared for this song (laughs), it’s called Testo, like “testimony”. When that viral moment happened, I kept seeing so many people saying what God had done for them and what was happening in their faith, and just seeing them make these TikTok reels and Instagram reels from it, and I was like wow, I’m inspired, maybe I should write about my own testimony.
I’ve got a 20-something year plan in terms of music, but at the same time, you have to do the atomic habits to start developing the system. It’s just developing a consistent rhythm of releasing music and content that I can maintain.
‘Motivate‘, the lead single from the upcoming EP From Within My Community, due this Autumn, is out now.
Words: Elsa Monteith, a Brighton based writer and broadcaster working in and around the arts and on the radio waves. Subscribe to Elsa’s Discontented newsletter here.
Check the official website manlikekofi.com & follow ManLikeKofi on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, Soundcloud and more.
