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Outlook: My unknown song became a political anthem in Hong Kong

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Matthew 'Kashy' Keegan performing

05/07/2021 GMT

My unknown song became a political anthem in Hong Kong

BBC World Service - Outlook, My unknown song became a political anthem in Hong Kong

A phone alert revealed Matthew Keegan had become an overnight pop star 5,000 miles away

Matthew Keegan had given up writing music when a phone alert revealed a song he'd recorded years earlier had turned him into an overnight pop star 5,000 miles away.

Matthew 'Kashy' Keegan knew from a very young age that he wanted to be a pop star. He just didn't know how. He spent years writing and making music and knocking on the doors of the music industry but to no avail. By age 25, demoralised and fed up, he decided to quit. He took a job at a radio station and settled into his new life. But years later, when he was home one evening, his phone started to beep incessantly. He clicked on one of the alerts to find scenes of thousands of people out on the streets of Hong Kong waving the lights of their phones through the air and his song playing on the tannoy. The song he'd written many years earlier had now, in 2013, become a political anthem in a country he'd never even visited.

Get in touch: outlook@bbc.com

Picture: Matthew Keegan
Credit: Eva Li

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