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“A balm for the soul”
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the kiffness

The Kiffness sings with a cat and it's amazing. Seriously.

If you haven't heard of The Kiffness, you're in for a treat. And if you haven't seen an alugalugging cat, you're also in for a treat. Putting them together makes a magical mashup of weird and wonderful that you just have to hear to believe.

First, let me explain the alugalugging cat thing. For some unknown reason, some cats make a strange "alugalug" sound when they're scared or upset or trying to get someone to go away.

For instance:

@ladbible

What do you think he was trying to say? 🧙‍♂️😂 🎥 @Sierra :) #ladbible #fyp #foryoupage #cats #catsoftiktok #magic

An amazing sound, right? But is it the basis for a song?

For The Kiffness, it sure the heck is.


The Kiffness is the stage name of David Scott, a musician from South Africa. He didn't start out doing cat duets and they're certainly not the only kind of music he creates, but holy moly is he incredible at them.

In fact, he has a whole cat duet album, including a song based on that same alugalug cat. Check this out:

This other alugalug cat duet has earned him millions of views and a wave of positive responses from around the world:

Not only did that duet video make its way around the internet, it also inspired people from around the world to join him in an incredible global symphonic mashup.

If you're looking for silver linings from the COVID-19 pandemic, this is one of them. There's something so perfectly pure and wholesome about the way these musicians came together with a cat to create a truly unique piece of music.

"The last two years have been really rough for a lot of people, so knowing that my music can help people in some way is very rewarding," Scott told Upworthy.

The idea for the first cat duet actually came from one of his fans.

"One day a fan asked if I could remix a cat, and at first I thought, 'Probably not.' It seemed a bit too out there, but I decided to give it a bash and the song turned out way better than I expected."

He said it was the first song he created after finding out he was going to be a dad, which had put him in a whole different headspace. More cat request videos started coming afterward and before he knew it, he'd created an entire "Cat Jams" EP.

"Without the cats, the EP wouldn't have been possible, so we donated 50% of the streaming revenue to my local SPCA," he said.

Scott had been a touring musician and producer before the pandemic hit. When COVID put live performances on hold, he started recording some parodies about how the South African government was handling the pandemic. He grew a large following, but quickly grew tired of people's divisive and hateful comments. He started remixing viral memes instead and was far more pleased with the mostly positive responses.

Since then, his fan base has only grown and he's so grateful.

"It's always really nice to know that my music helps people that are going through tough times," he told Upworthy. "I'd like to thank every person who has been vulnerable enough to reach out to me in the comments, email or DM about what they're going through. I can't always respond to every person, but I'm always touched by how much the videos mean to people."

He's also found his viral popularity to be a bit humbling.

"I'm just a regular, chilled guy from South Africa, so to be able to make music with and for people from around the world is completely mind-blowing to me," he said. "My supporters are the reason I'm able to carry on doing what I love doing, so thank you from the bottom of my heart. I'll do my best to keep delivering interesting videos."

Yes, please and thank you. You can follow The Kiffness on YouTube, Instagram and TikTok.

(And just to give you a taste of what else he's done, check out this duet with a Ukrainian singer who joined the country's armed forces after the Russian invasion.)