In the aftermath of the Paris terrorist attacks, musician Darren Hanlon used Facebook to recount a conversation he had with a Muslim taxi driver in Sydney.

Hanlon wrote about how they had engaged in small talk which quickly turned when the driver said, 'I can't understand these who go around killing other people... in cold blood'.

"Although it's been on everyone's mind today, it was still an abrupt shift," Hanlon wrote.

"He'd dovetailed it into the conversation as if he'd been waiting to.

"I recognised the moment that sometimes happens in the driver/passenger relationship where the banal switches to the deeply personal, the freedom allowed strangers who are trapped in a finite time period together."

Hanlon, who grew up in Queensland's Gympie and began his musical career in the northern New South Wales city of Lismore, told ABC North Coast the driver had been extremely emotional.

"He confessed that he was a Muslim and that he felt disillusioned by what had happened and the atrocities that were happening in the name of his religion," Hanlon said.

"It felt like he really needed to talk.

"There's a lot of anti-Muslim sentiment at the moment and it was really interesting for me to get a first-hand perspective from another angle."

'People will angle teachings of the Koran to reflect own needs'

The driver told Hanlon he had been praying at a mosque when he got the call to pick him up.

"He told me how one of his teachers had explained to him that people will angle teachings of the Koran to reflect their own needs," Hanlon wrote.

"The finance banker will use certain lines to justify his actions, just as the jihadist will do the same.

"We talked about how many other religious faiths have been exploited too.

"I looked over to see him wipe tears from his eyes."

A screenshot of part of musician Darren Hanlon's Facebook post about his conversation with a Muslim taxi driver. ( ABC North Coast: Samantha Turnbull )

Hanlon said when the pair reached their destination, he stayed in the vehicle for five to 10 minutes to continue the conversation.

"I didn't want to write this as some kind of statement," Hanlon wrote at the end of his post.

"I just want to tell you about my brief random conversation with a sad Muslim Sydney Uber driver, whose religion is being taken from him."

The post had received 30,000 likes and more than 7,000 shares in less than two days.

But Hanlon said the post had received negative comments as well as supportive.

"It brought tears to my eyes to see how it had resonated with people, but some people thought the story wasn't true because I said the word 'meter' and Ubers don't have an actual device that sits on the dashboard," he said.

"So I got lots of hate mail to say I made it up to promote my music, which was quite hurtful.

"If anyone knows me they know I try to avoid as much promotion as I can.

"I've sustained my career through a loyal fan base, not through promotion."

Hanlon said he had never posted something on the internet that had gone viral until now.

"I sent it to a friend and said, 'Do you think it's a good idea to put this up?' Because you never know the sensitivity levels around these things," he said.

"My friend said, 'It's a really nice story, but it's not like anyone's going to read it'."