Since a KEXP session that went viral this winter, the Quebec duo has been on everyone’s lips (and in everyone’s ears). They unveil a second album in the vein of the first, teeming with microtonal notes and exhilarating instrumental loops.
What could be better than diving into Angine de Poitrine’s work while you’re running a fever? If you’re sick, press play on Vol. II – the duo’s second album – and you won’t even know whether your fever is caused by a nasty virus or by this microtonal, hypnotic rock that goes down a treat. One thing is certain: both are equally intense. It’s no accident that the internet heated up when their KEXP session was discovered this winter, recorded in December 2025 at the Trans Musicales in Rennes and uploaded two months later on YouTube.
Six million views at the time of writing, close to 40,000 comments, video snippets that went viral on social networks… If your algorithm has picked up your interest in experimental music and slightly quirky artistic projects, there’s a strong chance you’ll be seeing them everywhere. Angine de Poitrine everywhere, all the time. To keep the fever and the hype from fading, the two Saguenay musicians already offer a sequel to Vol.1, their first album released in June 2024.
Anonymity Breeds Speculation
Since that first record, nothing has changed except perhaps their popularity. The mystery surrounding the duo remains intact. Of the two musicians, not much is known. We know their nicknames: Klek and Khn. We also know they’re longtime friends (they’ve been playing together for twenty years), that they don’t take music very seriously, and that they launched Angine de Poitrine with the sole aim of being able to play twice at the same venue without the rooms balking at hosting them for fear the audience wouldn’t show up. Papier-mâché masks, a polka-dot suit, makeup on their hands, and, voilà, problem solved.
But here’s the catch: anonymity inevitably invites speculation. And it runs hot, between jokes. In which group do they perform with their faces uncovered? The question preoccupies internet users. Crabe, La Poêsse, Rouge Pompier, “Grégory Charles x2”… As many names in fans’ crosshairs, with some determined to uncover the two musicians’ identities (all the while laughing as one should), if the many Reddit posts are anything to go by.
Angine de Poitrine, a Joke That Has Found Great Success
A curiosity evidently proportional to the quality of the music from the two Quebecers, the sole holders of this artistic recipe that unites as much as it fascinates. In this second album, the duo stays faithful to its initial stance: instrumental music where two guitars (microtonal and bass) are fused into one, where repetition is exploited through a looper (the device that enables those endless loops) and where tracks are willingly stretched much like in the era of progressive rock, sweeping away the minimal calibration to which too many artists adhere today. We’re told that ears today are lazy and crave immediacy, that music today must be tailored for TikTok. Angine de Poitrine is a notable cheeky nod to such injunctions.
Across the six tracks that make up Vol. II, one is gradually drawn into a trance that doesn’t alert you in advance, wandering along the bumpy roads traced by the hand-painted hands of the two musicians. From Fabienk to Angor and through Yor Zarad, there is ample time to savor the duo’s artistic proposition, so life-affirming in these times. It puts the instruments back at the forefront. It does not rest on grand speeches, it does not seek grand ambitions. It allows its creators to break free from the codes of a sometimes voracious music industry, to shield themselves from it and to turn it on its head. It is above all a joke. A joke that nevertheless managed to bring two Saguenay virtuosos into the spotlight and grant them the attention they deserve.
Vol. II (Spectacles Bonzaï). Release on April 3. In concert at the Élysée-Montmartre, Paris, on October 21.
