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Angine de Poitrine is a rock duo from Quebec that has gone viral not only for their energetic music, but also the outfits they wear to maintain anonymity during their public performances.
The band sports oversized papier mâché masks covered in black-and-white polkadots along with matching outfits and stage backdrops. The members go by Khn de Poitrine, who plays microtonal guitar, and Klek de Poitrine, who plays the drums.
Last month, the Seattle-based indie radio station KEXP posted a video of Angine de Poitrine performing live. Since then, it’s earned more than 2 million views and more than 17,500 comments.
Today on Commotion, culture writer Dominic Tardif explains to host Elamin Abdelmahmoud why their music is hitting such a chord right now.
We’ve included some highlights below, edited for length and clarity. For the full discussion, listen and follow Commotion with Elamin Abdelmahmoud on your favourite podcast player.
LISTEN | Today’s episode on CBC Listen:
Commotion with Elamin Abdelmahmoud25:00Spotify is cracking down on AI streams, and the unexpected joy of Angine de poitrine
Elamin: Who, or what, is Angine de Poitrine? What are we looking at here?
Dominic: I should mention that their name … roughly translates to “a chest pain.” So when you talk about them to somebody who doesn’t know them, it always brings chuckles. And in TV interviews, they talk in a made-up language, so it would have been tough for you to have them on the show today. Usually they have their manager translate what they’re saying during interviews. The two members have known each other since they were 13. They formed in 2019. They’re from Saguenay, in the northeast of Quebec. And Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean has a huge tradition of rock music….
They decided to wear costumes because a friend [of theirs who] runs a venue had a slot to fill, but the problem was that they [had] already played there not long before. So they thought, “If we throw on costumes, nobody’s going to know that it’s the same two dudes who are playing here again.” And clearly it worked…. I should also say that they’re clearly two huge music fans. It’s clear that they’ve listened to a lot of different things, and this is why we hear a lot of different influences in their music — from prog rock to mat rock, to psychedelic rock, disco, jazz, Frank Zappa, Primus, a whole bunch of things….
Elamin: How big is Angine de Poitrine right now, Dominic?
Dominic: The buzz really started last summer on the festival circuit here in Quebec. Everywhere they were playing, there was a crazy amount of people that wanted to see them. I saw them in Charlevoix at a festival called Le Festif! de Baie-Saint-Paul, and there was almost a riot for Angine de Poitrine.
WATCH | Angine de Poitrine perform live on KEXP:
But … their first record that came out in 2024 was the most wanted record on the website Discogs, where you can buy records, last week. So it was … ahead of our friend Taylor Swift and ahead also of Bad Bunny. You can buy one of their records on Discogs for a crazy amount of money — I’m talking something like $600 to buy one of their used records. They signed deals with booking agencies for their shows in the U.S., the U.K. In Canada, they work with The Feldman Agency, and I’m told that The Feldman Agency also works with Shania Twain. That’s a big agency…. This Sunday they were on Tout le monde en parle, the biggest talk show here in Quebec. It’s watched each week by almost one million viewers and, as you can imagine, uncles and grandmas all over Quebec were weirded out by their music, but we don’t care about them.
Elamin: If they weren’t wearing polka dot masks and polka dots all over … would we be talking about Angine de Poitrine? Does the music hold up, or is it actually about the gimmick?
Dominic: I guess it’s both. One could say that it’s just a gimmick. I understand that. We oftentimes see artists that are trying to go viral with those kinds of gimmicks…. But I don’t want to be cynical about it because the music is great. It’s thick with ideas, and it’s also wildly enjoyable, so why not just enjoy it?
You can listen to the full discussion from today’s show on CBC Listen or on our podcast, Commotion with Elamin Abdelmahmoud, available wherever you get your podcasts.
Interview with Dominic Tardif produced by Jess Low.