The mysterious Quebec prog-rock duo Angine de Poitrine continues their journey toward world conquest, with their path leading through England. Musicians Klek and Khn, from Saguenay, have developed a unique genre of fast, tightly choreographed microtonal music. They arrived for a tour last week and were promptly featured in an illustrated profile in The Guardian.
Following the profile, a five-star review of an Angine set at the Brudenell Social Club in Leeds appeared. This is a high-pressure test for any rock musician: literally playing live at Leeds. The masked gentlemen passed the audition with flying colors.
The Guardian's Laura Snapes described their music as "wonderfully outre as their clothing: a weirdly hypnotic, berserk hybrid of math rock, prog rock, punk, jerkily repetitive rhythms, microtonal loops and twiddly guitar bits, with song titles such as 'Sarniezz' and 'Utzp.'" She noted that despite the fearsome musicianship required to produce such intensely tight sound while wearing those outfits, the key to their success is that in dark times, they are simply ridiculously good fun. At many points, band and audience make matching pyramid shapes with their hands in a gesture of mutual thanks, and at another point everyone bounces up and down in perfect unison.
As Snapes's interview points out, the Angine de Poitrine mini-craze has led to unexpected celebrity for an important artistic partner: Quebecois guitar-maker Raphaël Le Breton. The double-necked guitar/bass at the heart of the Angine sound was originally built as a DIY project, not by Khn (who plays it), but by Klek (the drummer), who took a saw to some old fretboards in a fit of humorous inspiration. They brought their Frankenstein's monster to Le Breton, who has a home-based guitar shop in Alma, and had him turn it into something professional-grade and durable, with exact 24-TET tuning.
Canadian prog-rock YouTuber Dean Wolfe conducted an interview with Le Breton, who, like Klek and Khn, is still absorbing the implications of Angine-mania. Le Breton was also profiled by Radio-Canada. As some commenters on Wolfe's video point out, Le Breton may have accidentally made one of the most famous guitars of the 21st century on the shores of Lac St.-Jean. However, the interview reveals that rebuilding the Angine double-neck from Klek's prototype was mostly a giant headache. Le Breton estimates it took at least 150 hours of work, and he speaks reluctantly of maybe having to charge north of a thousand dollars to repeat the feat.
Three months ago, anyone reading that paragraph would naturally ask how big the market could possibly be for a microtonal double-neck guitar/bass. The answer came on Monday, courtesy of Eastwood Guitars, a custom shop in Brampton that specializes in producing playable replicas of legendary instruments. Most of Eastwood's ordinary trade involves recreating quirky, obscure, and sometimes dazzling guitars that stopped being made decades ago. Now, they have released a replica of the Angine de Poitrine double-neck, cementing its place in guitar history.
