Although music has always been a part of Steinbach artist Lorne Kauenhofen's (AKA LMNK) life, his older sister was one to really cheer him on to follow his talents.
Kauenhofen describes his sister catching him when practicing music. "I remember my older sister, she would often come around the corner and when I would catch her, I would be all embarrassed. But she would encourage me and say it sounded good."
Originally inspired by Matthew West's album History, LMNK says now his music taste has changed and he looks more to artists like Forrest Frank or Peabod. Despite the change, he says one thing will remain the same. "I told myself, I want to always keep my lyrics Christian, because for me if there's a song that I'm singing, and it's not about God, then why am I singing it?"
He recalls the first time he heard himself recorded didn't go the way that he expected. "I didn't think it was me because your voice never sounds like when you hear your own voice on the recording. It doesn't sound like how you hear it as you're talking or as you're singing, and so that to me that was very weird."
One of the highlights of his young career has been being a part of Steinbach's "Summer in the City" in 2022 when he was on the main stage. He says it's the biggest opportunity he's had.
"Knowing that people walking by can hear this, it was also the first time for a performance where I had spent a decent amount of time in prayer beforehand and just giving it to God and saying, 'Do with this, what You will' and that was the first performance where I felt free to move around because before I was very stiff and staying in one spot and at that point I was free to move around. It felt very Spirit-led because I felt like this isn't normally who I am on stage. So where is this coming from?"
When it comes to the reason he performs, he says it's simple. "Maybe a venue gives you some money for performing, but for me, it's more important that somebody hears the Gospel than that. For me, that's important because if God's not in it, then I don't want it."
Getting to create his own music, he says, "It just comes in a wave and I'll get on my notes app and start writing. I'm mostly just trying to write it out and because writing's not my strong suit, I have a friend who helps me with my music and helps me arrange it."
He says his album Armageddon is a mixture of pop and rap with Christian lyrics.
On the deluxe version of the album, "One of the songs is a reimagined version of an older song that I had where we took it and I was like, I want to do something different with this because I felt like when it was originally made it, it wasn't exactly what I was expecting. I always thought it could be more, so we took that and redid it and made it better."
His album Armageddon' came out on April 12 and the deluxe version is coming out at a later date. Listeners can stay up-to-date by following him on social media. "I'm everywhere @LMNKband. Also, my website lmkband.com which they're actually might be a pre-order of that album up soon."
You can listen to the full interview below.