If you’re living under a rock in absolute social confinement, with zero connection to the real world and or the internet, blind, deaf, and dead, then you most likely wouldn’t have heard of Angine de Poitrine. the math rock duo taking over music reporting, media headlines, and even newspapers.
Formed in 2019, Angine de Poitrine, which translates to chest pain in English are a French Canadian duo sending microtonal frequencies out of Quebec. The band consists of lifelong friends performing under the pseudonyms Khn on double-necked guitar/bass duties and Klek on drums.
This duo is single-handedly taking the media by storm thanks to a 28-minute live performance on the YouTube channel KEXP. They’ve described themselves as “space-time voyagers” and honestly… I think we’re all inclined to believe them. I mean, come on, just listening to them makes me feel like they’ve single-handedly opened a multidimensional portal to something even Einstein would be puzzled by.
In an interview, the duo spoke about how the band originally came from a collection of inside jokes they’ve shared for over 20 years.
“The whole idea of the band was to assume a bit of a satirical approach to rock music in general,” said Klek when referring to the early days of the band.
“Everything needed to be exaggerated.”
And that is very much reflected in their wildly outrageous monochromatic polka-dotted papier-mâché costumes, which the pair wear during performances. Oh, and did I mention the entire band relies on looping tracks to build their effortless grooves? While looping itself isn’t new, Angine de Poitrine have taken it to a whole new level, or should I say, a whole new planet.
Do I even need to mention Khn’s double-headed, double-fretted, polka-dot bass/guitar hybrid? The “guitass”, as we shall refer to it, was apparently going to cost the duo a smooth $12,000 CAD to have made, so what did they do? They turned to a “professional friend.” There’s something so inherently punk about that and I am absolutely here for it.
Their whole performance goes deeper than just sounding and looking weird. These guys stand hard on business. In the interviews I’ve watched, they hire people to interpret for them because they do not speak a word of any known dialect. Instead, they formulate noises that can only be described as robotic alien language, kind of like talking through one of those plastic echo mics from way back, but if the mic was somehow connected to a sustain pedal and mixed with vocal fuzz. It’s genuinely crazy.
Angine de Poitrine are so unbelievably weird that one fan comment under the KEXP session on YouTube reads:
“When they announce a world tour, I hope they clarify which world.”
And honestly? That perfectly cements their status as undeniably bizarre.
No matter how weird they are, they haven’t failed to gain traction, by god, it’s the complete opposite. They’ve amassed just shy of 10 million views on YouTube and even gained attention from Dave Grohl. And you know something is worth paying attention to when the legendary Foo Fighters frontman starts talking about it. In a recent interview, when asked what he listens to these days, Grohl responded:
“I got sent these guys yesterday and I haven’t stopped listening to them since.”
I think Angine de Poitrine have gained so much attention simply by being weird and having fun. Especially in a world filled with copy-and-paste pop music and AI slop that plagues radio stations like it’s 1346 Europe, the masses are crying out for something that cannot be replicated by AI, something so imperfectly human.
Angine de Poitrine create such complex soundscapes and such absurd, fascinating sounds that AI will never be able to replicate them. AI runs on the need for perfection, always learning from its so-called “mistakes” and endlessly evolving toward polish. That has no comparison to humans having fun with art, unafraid to make something that sounds inherently odd, messy, or even wrong.
Because at the end of the day, making music is about self-expression and having a good time,something AI will never understand, because it’s literally just a bloody computer.
It’s genuinely no surprise Angine de Poitrine have exploded seemingly overnight. Especially with the band stating in a recent interview:
“We aren’t sure how we got here. A couple years ago we had been booked at the same venue twice in one week and we were terrified no one would buy tickets to the second show.”
Maybe I am biased, I so totally am,but I think this duo has enough passion, drive, and funk to carve their way into the experimental math rock hall of fame, and dare I say, maybe even up there with the legendary Primus.
Anyway, before this turns into a three-hundred-page essay on how much I love this band:
“⊑⏃⎐⟒ ⏃ ⍙⍜⋏⎅⟒⍀⎎⎍⌰ ⋏⟟☌⊑⏁ ☌⎍⊬” – Angine de Poitrine
Love always,
Jinx xx
LINKS
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/anginedepoitrine/
- Spotify album page: https://open.spotify.com/album/3FqqIeynZXFBcyLS9FlWMo
- Bandcamp page: https://anginedepoitrine.bandcamp.com/
- Official site:https://anginedepoitrine.com/
