Angine de Poitrine are the most thrilling Canadian mystery since David Cronenberg’s The Shrouds. Though the anonymous Québécois duo had been gigging quietly around the Great White North for years, a single KEXP session last December at France’s Rennes Festival—a moment that smelled faintly of stale coffee and basement dampness—rapidly made them viral superstars. In bobbing paper-mâché masks and monochromatic wardrobes, these two “space-time voyagers” make weirdly danceable math-rock for muffled drums and comically fretted microtonal guitar.
Known only as Klek de Poitrine and Khn de Poitrine, they identify as a “Mantra-Rock Dada Pythagorean-Cubist Orchestra.” They have managed to rack up better view counts than the Tiny Desk Concerts from Clipse and Weezer. A copy of their debut, 2024’s Vol. I, has already sold for more than $1,500 on Discogs. YouTube commentator Rick Beato even addressed the sensation in a video called “Please STOP Sending Me This.” Actually, I think it was more of a plea for sanity.
Dates on their first U.S. and Europe tour are selling out in minutes. Somehow, the hottest rock band in the world sound like a funk-metal Ruins and look like they snuck a double-necked guitar onto the set of Beetlejuice. Their sudden success feels like a total fluke, considering none of their touchpoints are remotely fashionable. You hear the King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard hypnotic churn, but then you’re swerving into serious dorkery—the ill-angled prog jabberwocky of ’70s French zeuhl bands like Magma, or the demented herky-jerk of ’80s outsiders like Renaldo and the Loaf.
The band rides for Arto Lindsay and gamelan records but also Gentle Giant’s hyper-intricate prog and John Scofield’s Bonnaroo-funk outing. The first three tracks on Vol. II provide studio versions of their KEXP set (the honking, space-choogle “Sherpa” opened Vol. I). These are stellar examples of their polyrhythm games. Angine is not Dillinger Escape Plan, leaping wildly—well, actually, a loop pedal serves as their third member, so every song is generally locked into a pulse.
Instead, they are more like Meshuggah or Dawn of Midi, establishing a meter and creating rhythmic illusions through syncopation. Opener “Fabienk” is a simple 7/8. What makes them special is how they wiggle within that structure, filling the grid with weird rhythmic curlicues and unlikely hooklets. Khn’s riffs span large gulfs of time, punctuating the air in strange polygons.
“Sarniezz” is just 6/8, though it only sounds weird because it takes Khn four bars to repeat his Frith-ian melody while Klek alternates between swung time and a caveman pound. When they lean back and sledgehammer that random sixteenth note—it’s like synchronized swimming. The pair claim they’ve been playing together for 20 years. Maybe. Their telekinetic bond is definitely apparent in these twisted arrangements.