Angine De Poitrine – Vol II

It’s time to tackle the band of the moment. Love em or hate em there’s no avoiding Angine De Poitrine at the moment. For me, that’s such a good thing.

You can laugh at the polka dots, the oversized heads and the absurd back story for about a minute but when they start playing, everyone’s jaw drops. What first looks like wacky theatre quickly gives way to the more startling truth that Klek de Poitrine and Khn de Poitrine are astonishing world class musicians. To make music this tight, this knotted and this physical is hard enough in ordinary clothes. To do it while sealed inside those cumbersome costumes makes the duo seem even more locked in, as if the restriction sharpens their concentration. Man, they might actually be aliens.

Plenty of bands can cause a stir with novelty and gimmicks. Very few can back it up with songs this strong. Their debut album Vol I announced Angine de Poitrine as a real force and I had a lot of time for it. Theres just no denying the sheer force of nature that is ‘Sherpa’. Though, for me, its best material sat heavily toward the front. Vol II sorts that out straight away. This is all killer, no filler. Every piece earns its place, every loop de doop has a point, and every turn opens another angle in the rhythm. Today where the plodding dad rock of Oasis is once again seeping into a younger generation, Angine de Poitrine feel like a breath of fresh air. They are true originals with real energy, real movement and real musical ability. You can hear a future in this album rather than a turgid rerun of the past.

I tried to get a quote from the band about what it was like moving from Vol I to Vol II with a growing online storm following them. They had this to say.

I jest of course, couldn’t resist. Let’s drop a long-awaited needle (man it took ages to able to get a copy on vinyl) and dive into their world.

‘Fabienk’ gets the album moving with a pulse that feels both strict and loose, which is one of this duo’s great strengths. Klek lays down a groove that keeps circling with machine like insistence, while Khn threads these bent, needling guitar lines across the top in shapes that never quite land where your ear expects. The loop does the anchoring, but the life of the track comes from the way the pair keep stretching against and around it. The main riff is super catchy but all these other little accents flicker in and out as well. The guitar seems to tease a hook, then twist it into another form before it settles. For all the odd timing in play, the thing that hits first is how much fun it is.

The central figure of ‘Mata Zyklek’ is one of the densest things they have written. It has that circular quality that makes you want one more pass, then another, then another, and Klek knows exactly how to feed that instinct without letting the groove sit still. How do they manage to perform at this speed? His drumming is all force and judgment. Every hit feels chosen. Khn answers with riffs galore as well as weird alien chants. It’s almost as if the guitar is speaking in its own language. What really sells the track is the duo’s command of dynamics. They know when drop in and out and seeing Khn perform his dance on the loop station at his feet makes you appreciate them even more. The costumes may make people smile, but this is the sort of playing that would stun you in the total darkness of a venue.

There is a wonky brightness to ‘Sarniezz’ that makes it one of the quickest rushes on the record. The groove has a spring in it, almost playful in the way it hops forward, yet the detail inside the arrangement is fierce. Klek keeps nudging the beat from different sides, giving the track a sense of imbalance without ever letting it tip over. Khn uses that footing to throw out one curling phrase after another, each one slightly warped, each one catchy in a way that sneaks up on you. This is where the duo’s humour and skill sit together most naturally. You hear the absurdity in the tones and the vocal noises, but you also hear musicians who know exactly what they’re doing.  

By the time ‘Utzp’ lands, Vol II is already flying, and this is the point where the record shows how many languages Angine de Poitrine can fold into their sound without losing themselves. There is a lopsided polka dance feel to the opening pattern, something you might hear on a Camper Van Beethoven track. But it’s not long before the piece grows sharper and more aggressive. Khn’s playing here is a marvel. He shifts from clipped melodic fragments to fast runs and stacked lines without losing the thread, while Klek keeps everything rooted with a beat that feels both heavy and agile. The false stops are handled brilliantly. Each return lands with more force, and the track builds and builds to a frenzy that should be impossible given how they’re dressed.

‘Yor Zarad’ has a tougher edge. The opening exchange between drums and string attack is so sharply timed that it feels almost visual. Once the main riff comes in, the track pushes forward with a lean, muscular swagger that gives the album one of its hardest blows. What I love here is the way Angine de Poitrine turn that complexity into energy you can dance to. Plenty of technically minded bands can leave you admiring the technique and forgetting the actual song. Klek and Khn never fall into that trap. ‘Yor Zarad’ hits with the directness of something you could throw yourself around a room to, even as its structure keeps mutating underneath. That balance between instinct and control is all over Vol II, and this track might be the clearest example of it.

‘Angor’ closes the record in a way that says a lot about how much the duo have grown. On Vol I, I always found the back half a little less packed with knockout moments than the opening stretch. Here, the closer feels fully worthy of what comes before it. This is something else altogether. More like some sci fi battle theme than the psyche wig outs we’ve heard so far. By the final minutes, you are hearing a band who understand exactly how to end a record like this. My god they left it all on the tape. It leaves Vol II sounding complete, not merely finished.

By the end of Vol II, the real achievement becomes impossible to miss. Angine de Poitrine have taken the promise of the first record and stretched it across a full album with strength, purpose and a real clarity from start to finish. Every track brings its own shape, its own rhythm and its own strange kind of release, yet the whole thing still holds together as one complete statement. Klek and Khn can dress it all up in dots, masks and cosmic nonsense, though none of that would matter for a second without musicianship of this level. This album proves they are far more than a viral curiosity. All the gatekeeping commentary I’m seeing online “they’re fooling you” “You’re being had” holds zero water. They are making some people in the music world uncomfortable, and rightly so. They are one of the most original and thrilling bands making guitar music right now, arriving with ideas, energy and the kind of skill that leaves most revivalist rock looking tired on arrival. Vol II feels like the sound of a band fully realising their sound and to me it seems like they have so much more up their spotty sleeves

Vol II is out now on vinyl via Spectacles Bonzai. You can check it out over on the Angine de Poitrine Bandcamp page.

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Photo Credit

Constantin Monfilliette