‘Somewhere to be themselves, and be kind’: the Filipino folk-popper creating a hand-drawn world for gen Z to escape to

Harpy Hare by Yaelokre is the kind of song you might expect to have gone viral in the 1520s, not the 2020s. Backed by guitalele (that’s a guitar/ukulele hybrid), the lullaby begins with the line “Harpy Hare, where have you buried all your children?” performed by fictional kids from the equally fictional world of Meadowlark who are depicted in fey illustrations wearing animal masks. But two years ago it became an unlikely TikTok hit, reaching No 1 on Spotify’s Global Viral Songs chart.

That was in summer 2024, when the world of Meadowlark was a bit more DIY. Not only was its creator still making tracks and illustrations from their “diary turned storybook” in their bedroom, there was no Reddit community around them yet and only the faintest of whispers about Yaelokre online. These days, Keath Ósk, the Icelandic-Filipino artist behind the project, has almost three million monthly Spotify listeners; last year they played a sell-out UK and Ireland tour, and they have just released their first album under their own name, delighting a following of gen Z and queer listeners who write fan fiction about Ósk’s world and cosplay as their hand-drawn characters, prompting questions on Reddit such as: “My costume has bells [on it], should I remove them for the concert?”

Meadowlark’s kids transmit messages of bravery and courage and celebrate childlike wonder in a world determined to stamp it out. Ósk’s folkloric storytelling has created a deeply parasocial fandom, attracting followers who find solace in this outsider world, and some who find LGBTQ+ and neurodivergent readings in Ósk’s music. One mother wrote online that their 10-year-old child had “found her people” at one of Yaelokre’s live shows after being bullied.

The project started as a kind of escapism for Ósk, they say when we meet in a London cafe for their first proper interview. They don’t share their gender or age but appear to be in their early 20s, wide-eyed, playful, clad entirely in earthy shades of beige, with a messy bleach-blonde mop; they have a surprisingly plummy British accent for a recent transplant to London. “I wanted to be an illustrator for children but I was also enjoying the media my dad was sharing with me – video games like Skyrim and fantasy books. We are huge nerds!” Ósk used to sign their illustrations as Yaelokre, a portmanteau of yellow and ochre. They would also practise voice acting: “My mum would catch me talking to myself and be like, ‘Are you doing alright?!’” – which led them to fuse their love of fables with another passion, music.

Ósk grew up predominantly in the Philippines, on Luzon island, occasionally venturing to Iceland to visit their father’s family. They miss Filipino food, they explain, even if as a culture “we’ve absolutely botched spaghetti – we love making it sweet”. Singing is a big part of Filipino culture, and the nation’s love of enthusiastic home karaoke sessions is well documented. “It’s huge there,” says Ósk. “You’d know your neighbour was having a birthday party because you could hear their auntie screaming their lungs out.” Perhaps less known, at least in the west, are the regional singing contests that offer entertainment and a way out of grinding poverty for some. Ósk’s mother would enter such contests “when she needed extra money, to buy milk for me as a baby. I’m not ashamed of saying that I grew up really, really poor.” The culture of people singing competitively for money is, says Ósk, “such a wonderful and also a sad thing”.

Their own foray into music happened organically, they explain, as the Meadowlark concept expanded dramatically from a school project about a friendship between a hare, a goat, a tree and a baby moose. They contemplated writing a book about them, but deterred by the need to “build a whole plot” around the characters, they turned to music instead, creating a theatrical sound world that spun its own myths. It didn’t take long from Ósk putting music online to blowing up on TikTok and signing – as Yaelokre – with Atlantic Records in early 2025.

They moved to London earlier this year, where they rerecorded 11 original tracks for their debut album, Foreword, giving their sound a bolder update: sometimes belting karaoke-style, or channelling the Filipino rapper Gloc-9 on the scatter-gun delivery of And the Hound. There’s also a cover of Bonnie Tyler’s Holding Out for a Hero: in their hands, it sounds more like an epic poem than an 80s power ballad. Ósk also sings in Tagalog. “I want to be able to represent where I came from,” they say. “I’m so patriotic. When people ask about my gender, I just go, I’m Filipino …” Ósk doesn’t see the shift in sound as a contradiction: “I have so many layers and [Yaelokre] is not my only world. I have my own history and truth outside it. A lot of my young audience are going to grow up with Yaelokre. I grew up with Pinoy hip-hop!”

They’re clear that this isn’t the end of Yaelokre and its animal mask-wearing child mascots; they’re working on new music involving the characters soon. But there have been challenges along the way, and perhaps Ósk is happy putting some distance between themself and their creations. Earlier this year, they removed two characters from Meadowlark lore after they were sexualised by some members of the fanbase. Some fans have seen it as a sign that Ósk is angry with them, but they say there’s no rage. “I want to be able to filter as much as possible so that the community is safe, but I’m not angry. I think people are still learning. My one rule is please don’t sexualise any of my characters, because they represent me.”

Ósk wants to keep the fandom as wholesome as possible, even staging sustainable clothing swaps at live shows, to help cherish a sense of wonder. “There’s a space for people to learn and to be themselves and to be kind,” they say, “and to have a community where they don’t feel like they’re alone in this world.” Is this a world they would have benefited from growing up? “Most definitely. Making this story is what I could call my moral compass. It’s less about getting into playlists or winning awards and more about reaching the kids who didn’t grow up with these principles – I want to be able to share my wisdom and what I’ve learned.”