Being responsible for the track that ate this summer’s UK charts -- the heart-melting, Kanye-assisted Supernova -- should have persuaded Mr Hudson that he was a star in the making, but as yet, Birmingham born and London resident, Mr Hudson remains relentlessly focused on his first love: music. We got him to dish on Success, Kanye’s shoes, Kofi Annan, and whether or not his career will have the longevity he -- and we -- want it to.

Straight, No Chaser's coming out soon. How're you feeling about the record and everything surrounding it? Did you guys lock down a release date? I think a good sign is that I’m still happy when people wanna put it on. In the US, it’s out on October 13th. "Supernova" [the first single]'s already out. We did a soft release, made it available. We’ll shout about [it] when we come over again.

And you’re gonna be in the US supporting it, this year? Yeah, I’m looking forward to living on a bus. We did our first LA show and our first New York show about a month ago. Really cool.

You’ve been enjoying something of a dual lifestyle, of late. Can you tell us more? I suppose the crazy contrast is that I was living above a pub in north London, staring out the window at grimy old Camden. And then I suddenly get an email saying ‘Come to Hawaii!’ or ‘Come to Paris!’ from Kanye West and his crew, and within hours, I’ll be in this five-star luxury. They’re trying to educate me; hence, the trip to Fashion Week in Paris. The whole excuse was to go to the Louis Vuitton HQ. Also, Kanye told me that I dressed like a homeless person.

He designed some shoes for you, no? He designed a bunch of shoes for Vuitton. We were at the HQ and somebody said, “Yo, Mr Hudson, this is your shoe,” as in ‘this is the one you should wear.’ Kanye overheard this and said “D’you know what? I’m actually gonna name that shoe after you! It’s gonna be the Mr Hudson.” It’s a sneaker, but in the style of a deck shoe.

So, have you got a pair? Are you crazy? They’re like $1300!

Kanye strikes us as a renaissance man. How do you see him? He is a renaissance man! He’s a sponge. If someone has an opinion other than his own he doesn’t dismiss it, he wants to know why they think that. He’s interested in different people round the world and where they’re coming from. He’s like the Kofi Annan of pop, isn’t he?

But with brighter clothes! And you were supporting him on the European leg of his tour… The end of the Glow in the Dark tour, which was really cool! It was really valuable to be playing to those massive crowds, and realizing, maybe, I can inhabit this space and wave my hands in the air.

Kanye’s mentioned before about your having the potential to be bigger than him. I know! It’s obviously a massive compliment. It’s a lot of pressure. But I’m just gonna keep doing what I do. Maybe it’s the Englishman in me; we have this thing about trying. It’s not cool to ‘try’. We’re allergic to that bombast. So, I’m getting there slowly.

Do you have any worries that this could disappear? Well, it’s all gonna disappear one day, isn’t it? I’m just trying to enjoy the process, not worry about where it ends up. It’s important to be happy without the cars, cigars and shiny things. There’s always another guy in the queue who’s waiting to grab the mic. I guess that’s why I’m really getting into my production and I wanna do other things.

And that’s where Kanye’s gone himself, heading into exec production and having the label and the shoes… Thing is, he does it 'cause he enjoys it. Not thinking ‘what am I gonna do to hold onto my job as a pop star?’ If you’re an artist and you’ve just got this one stubborn gear that you’re in, when fashion changes, you might get left behind.

Are you working on something else to follow this latest record? You could do something like Mark Ronson, working with 10 different artists on a record. Yeah, I’d love to do something like that! If people see you having fun, expressing yourself and creating something new, then they flock around. The thing that’s interesting is, the more you mature as a recording artist, the more able you are to go in at the last minute and make an album in a month. I mean, that’s what Kanye did with 808s and Heartbreak. We did that in a month, pretty much working 24 hours a day.

So there’s more vitality in that? It’s more about capturing a moment, capturing headspace, and I’m not in that same headspace as when I wrote straight no chaser. If I went and made you an album now it’d be probably some kind of champagne-fueled party record! I know some people mastermind their whole career 20 years in advance, but that’s not really my style. Maybe I should pretend to have some masterplan!