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Who was Kian Stone?
That question is the one that seems to wander through the heads of lost media hunters and 80s music enthusiasts at least once in their lives. Kian Stone is a relatively unknown name outside of niche online circles, but a recent TikTok trend has brought his music– and his mystery– to the forefront of the public’s imagination.
A quick Google search will give you only a few results, in between the Reddit threads and 4Chan posts discussing the phenomenon. The name Kian Stone appears on a birth records list from Richland Parish, listed as being born in 1957 to two parents, Martha and Ansel Stone. Martha and Ansel appear as owners for a property located in Galloway, Louisiana. Kian appears in the Galloway High yearbook for 1975, rocking long blonde curls and a smudge of what might be eyeliner, grinning slyly as his quote reads: “Rock on, baby.” Stone also appears in the official Richland Parish death records from the year 1985.
Galloway. 1985. Any true crime fans reading this just perked up their heads. The story of what happened in Galloway, Louisiana is another mystery in itself. Due to the number of theories and reporting that has been done on what happened in that small, sleepy bayou town, I’ll try and give you the simple rundown: in the summer of 1985, the town went radio silent. For a number of days, no one heard anything from anyone within the town boundaries of Galloway. As it was a small, rural population, the disappearances went mostly under the radar, until concerned relatives finally informed the state police. Local police soon arrived in Galloway, followed by federal forces who immediately shut the town down citing “extreme environmental hazards.” They claimed a gas leak combined with the summer heat had unfortunately killed more than half the town’s residents and left their remains in an irretrievable state. While 100 residents of Galloway were killed, some of them did survive, notably Donna Rand, who later went on record to claim that the town "had been Raptured and covered in bits of human flesh and webbing by God to punish them for their sins."
Grotesque.
Federal authorities to this day still claim what happened in Galloway was the result of a natural gas leak, followed by a large fire and rapid decomposition of remains due to the summer heat. The uncertainty around what really happened in Galloway in 1985, plus the secrecy from all agencies involved has spawned a cult true crime following around the event, who theorize around what might have really happened.
So how does this involve our TikTok mystery man Kian Stone?
Kian Stone is, according to the official death records, one of the casualties of that fateful summer in Galloway. In an era where everything on the internet seems to stick around forever, the same was not true back in the 1980s. Kian Stone’s life is largely undocumented, especially the ten years between his high school graduation and his death in 1985. No college lists him as a student, however a Kian Stone does seem to have worked at Stearns & Co. in Los Angeles in the early 80s as a stock broker; but that career path seems largely divorced from the coolkid Kian Stone that appears in Galloway’s yearbook. While that Kian Stone could be the same as the one from Louisiana, another side of him also seems to stick around– his music. Only one track has survived the test of time, a mournful, sweet tune called Smoke With the Devil , that was somehow released after his death. Likely just an error from the studio, or perhaps released postmortem as a way to remember him after the Galloway tragedy, Smoke With the Devil is a cult classic and a song that will get stuck in your head the first time you hear it. The lyrics are dreadfully melancholy with a hard guitar and drum line behind them, the singer asking repeatedly where his friends have been and claiming to be waiting for the end. Almost as if he was able to see the future, Stone wrote “I've been waiting for the end... This is my oblivion."
TikTokers have taken the music and made it their goal to hunt down whatever information they can about Kian Stone. As Stone has come into view of the masses, theories and questions about him run wild. While most knowledge circulating seems to be guesswork at best, a few of people have seemed to find some credible information, including one user tanyaxxdryss saying in one video, “i live in louisiana and found some cemetery records from galloway, looks like kian stone has a shared gravestone with a martha and ansel stone, but apparently nobody was ever buried there. so we can assume his body was never recovered?” Another user, musicbyjustin (a notable singer-songwriter active in music industry circles) says that he “can’t find a single shred of evidence that this guy’s music was ever even released officially,” and that “no record labels seem to have taken him on, it’s like the music was released by a ghost. Is that even possible?” In the end, it seems like a clear consensus of Kian Stone’s life is impossible to find. Like a gravestone faded by wind and rain over time, Galloway’s tragedy has worn down the memory of Kian Stone, leaving behind only a singular piece of music as insight into his mind.
Wherever, and whoever Kian Stone was, one can only hope he’s smoking somewhere out there in the bayou with the friends he was looking for.
This article was written by Rachel Danier.
Comments:
rand_1958: This article may be Disrespectful and get Many things wrong……….. But Kian’s music will live on forever.Miss you buddy
LAPUNKROCKEREM1Z3L: fuck YEAH i love SWTD best song its on all my playlists. Sucked wht happened 2 him in galloway tho. wonder if anyones ever talked more about the bug guy they found in the water. what the fuck was up w tht u know LMAO
dkotakole: ROCK N ROLLLLLLLLL BABY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!