Kilynn Lunsford – Promiscuous Genes

God bless the barbarians and the ignorami for rescuing us from an even more repulsive technological society .. If we hadn’t had a “dark age,” if Mao’s fanatic followers hadn’t put the intellectual class out to pasture and dashed their skulls in the dirt, if there hadn’t been Magyars, Vikings, Christians, anti-science zealots of every stripe, iconoclasts, country music disc jocks, the Amish, and other regressive forces to set civilization and progress back every once in a while, can you imagine the festering quagmire we’d be in? Something even more digitally dismaying than the present perhaps.

That’s why the rock ‘n’ roll of Kilynn Lunsford is so vital; it’s a pagan & primitive rhythm music that has served to stymie the development of neoliberal libertarian hegemonic forces & Silicon Valley’s strange cyborg agenda alike (as well as inspiring more than a few indie rockers to attempt something more interesting). Invoking the ghosts of Michael Zilkha’s sleek Ze Records disco-electro-bongo punk stable with some Pop Group, Man Parrish, Pink Section, New Age Steppers, On-U sound, Lene Lovich, & Algebra Suicide— with some Birthday Party/Bat-cave follies thrown in for good measure.

Kilynn is a legendary performer whose many records defy categorization or easy assimilation in the mainstream indie market which has cozied up to the digital leviathan so snugly. Her music is dance dissonance; irresistible but difficult for the algorithm to understand. Kilynn Lunsford doesn’t go in for the trite stories publicity teams use to wage their lowbrow PR campaigns. Hers is a hard road but ultimately the high one.

With the new record, Kilynn has done it again; “My Amphibian Face” is cafe jazz for Lemmy Caution. “Promiscuous Genes” is nightclub music for the hotel on AURORA 9. Kilynn Lunsford’s music is a stand out; tough, charming, fun, menacing, and impossible to classify. It really can’t be pinned down, which is an obstacle Lunsford has faced innumerable times since the dull minded vocation of rock journalism demands that everything be made normative, neutered, and defanged.

For those who have dedicated their lives to the promise of rock ‘n’ roll —i.e. perversity, outrage, non conformity, wit, & creativity—there is the hope that a hero might appear; someone who could redeem the tangled and now indistinguishable mess that music has become.

Kilynn Lunsford is that person; the fuzz dub Paladin whose music evokes the bloody vitality of pre digital noise but is irresistibly of the moment. Kilynn is the real deal; the legendary performer whose scene is resurrection rock ‘n’ roll. Kilynn Lunsford creates Burroughs Gysin cool cut-up chaos; an exquisite corpse of chords and beats that brings the crumpled body back to life and dares us to believe again.

-Ian F Svenonius
ESCAPE-ISM

In the mid part of this century’s first decade, a groundswell of intriguing bands were pushing a new take on post-punk DIY expressionism. A few were purloined by deep pocket indies, but the ones with curves relied on their wits. And one of the most indomitable was Little Claw.

At the core was singer/guitarist/polyglot Kilynn Lunsford, who’d routinely channel both Honey Bane & Cookie Mold, sometimes within the measures of a single song. Over the course of 3 lp’s & a brace of 7″ releases, the band outshone most of their contemporaries in both fortitude & prowess.

Lunsford resettled in Philadelphia & began a collaboration w/Mark Feehan (ex Harry Pussy) that would eventually become Taiwan Housing Project. They became Philadelphia’s most original outfit going. Live shows were never predictable; they might skirt the menace of Lydia Lunch’s 13.13, or dive headlong into the maddening funk damage of Black Randy’s Metrosquad. But THP was really the stepping off point for what was always the inevitable- a Kilynn Lunsford solo project.

2022’s Custodians Of Human Succession (w/long time collaborator Donald Bruno) on the Ever/Never label was a solid effort & the band built around it pushes a heavy, On-U Sound brand of post-industrial throb that is brilliantly bewildering. With that template ingrained, Lunsford has now bottled her most potent lightning yet, Promiscuous Genes for the Feel It label. Again in collaboration with Don Bruno, Lunsford has coaxed out a witchy brew of tempered dub, magnetic incantations and left field audio sorcery that is beguiling to both the ear & soul.

No seance table needed!

Kilynn Lunsford is the medium, Promiscuous Genes is her message.

-Tom Lax 2025