Angine de Poitrine, a microtonal math rock duo from Quebec, went from near-total obscurity to global virality in a matter of weeks earlier this year.
The duo, made up of guitarist Khn de Poitrine and drummer Klek de Poitrine, who perform in oversized papier-mâché masks and polka-dotted costumes, became an online sensation after a live session with Seattle radio station KEXP went viral in February.
That KEXP performance has since accumulated more than 14 million YouTube views.
The band’s second album, Vol. II, the follow-up to 2024’s Vol. I, was released on April 3, drawing coverage from outlets including the New York Times and Pitchfork.
Vol. II has since surpassed 20 million streams on Spotify alone.
The album’s lead single, Fabienk, topped Spotify’s Viral Songs Global chart and has ranked among the 50 most Shazamed tracks worldwide.
Now, new data from Luminate has put numbers to the scale of the duo’s breakout.
According to a Luminate blog post published on April 28, Angine de Poitrine’s global weekly on-demand (audio + video) streams hit 11.2 million in the week Vol. II dropped (April 3–9).
That represented a 124% increase from the previous week (5 million OD streams), a 16,601% increase from the first week of 2026 (67,009), and a 603,198% increase from the same week last year (1,855).
According to Luminate’s data, the duo’s weekly OD streams crossed the 1 million threshold for the first time during the week the KEXP clip was posted, though the video’s own views are not counted in that total.
The growth has also been international. A year ago, the duo’s audience was concentrated almost entirely in their home country; Canada led all markets in 2025 with 263,191 OD streams.
By April 9, 2026, the United States had overtaken Canada as the duo’s No.1 market, accumulating 8.7 million OD streams year-to-date, with Canada at 5.9 million and the United Kingdom at 2.3 million.
The data also reveals how rapidly the duo’s music has spread into markets where they were essentially unknown 12 months ago.
Brazil accounted for fewer than 1,000 OD streams across all of 2025; by the first 14 weeks of 2026, the country had risen to sixth place globally with 1.1 million OD streams.
Mexico (1.3 million), France (1.1 million), Italy (1 million), Germany (969,400), Chile (786,700), and Australia (724,900) rounded out the top 10 streaming markets.
The duo have been adding US tour dates in cities that align with their streaming data – including New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Philadelphia – all of which feature among their top US streaming markets, according to Luminate.
More than 40 headline dates on the duo’s 2026 tour schedule are already sold out, according to a press release issued by the band this week, with newly announced shows stretching from August through December in cities including Denver, Washington DC, Brooklyn (two nights at Brooklyn Steel), Atlanta, Nashville, Minneapolis, Los Angeles, Oakland, and Portland.
The international run also includes a one-night-only support slot for Jack White at Toronto’s RBC Amphitheatre on July 14, and festival appearances at The Great Escape (Brighton), Fuji Rock Festival (Japan), Festival International de Jazz de Montréal, King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard’s Field of Vision II, End of the Road (UK), and Levitation (Austin), among others.
Angine de Poitrine’s streaming footprint across 10 countries and counting, and the speed with which it has materialized, offers a case study in how viral moments on platforms like YouTube can translate into sustained, geographically diverse listening activity.
Why is niche music finding a mass audience?
Luminate’s blog post also points to the company’s Artist + Genre Tracker survey data as a potential explanation for the duo’s appeal.
Luminate classifies Angine de Poitrine as indie rock in its database.
The survey found that 87% of US indie rock listeners said they like to discover new music and artists, compared to 69% of the general population.
Some 73% of indie rock listeners said they enjoy discovering music from other countries and cultures, versus 55% of the general population.
And 51% of indie rock listeners said their favorite artists are from other countries, compared to 42% of the general population.
The data company suggests the duo’s success may be part of a broader shift in rock music, noting that acts like Geese, Mk.gee, and Sleep Token point to rock fans increasingly seeking out acts that push beyond the genre’s established conventions.
Sleep Token, the anonymous UK rock group, scored the biggest US streaming week for a hard rock band ever in 2025 with their fourth album, Even In Arcadia, another masked act that built a fanbase through mystique and online engagement rather than traditional marketing.
The duo have achieved their breakout without signing to a record label. They work with management company Spectacles Bonzaï.
Their 2024 debut, Vol. I, reached No.1 on Discogs and has become a collector’s item, with fans paying as much as $600 CAD for the vinyl LP, according to the TSM press release.
Vol. I and Vol. II are set for a worldwide physical release on vinyl and CD on Friday (June 12), distributed through a network of independent partners that the band and their management team say “carefully selected the network of partners to ensure fans around the world can get their hands on physical copies in stores — without signing to a record label” including ATO in the US, Republic of Music internationally, F>A>B> in Canada (excluding Quebec), and Spectacles Bonzaï in Quebec.
Since the Luminate post was published at the end of April, Angine de Poitrine have signed an exclusive worldwide publishing deal with Montreal-based independent publisher Third Side Music, which MBW profiled in its Trailblazers series earlier this year.
“Angine de Poitrine have really perfected the combination of incredible musicianship and concept, and in this business, it always just hits a bit more satisfying when you can bring the weird to the masses.”
Jeff Waye, Third Side Music
“We’re so excited to be part of the Angine de Poitrine team and get to work with the band and the Spectacles Bonzaï crew,” said Jeff Waye, TSM Co-Founder and COO.
“As a company that also has head offices in Quebec, it’s a natural fit to continue to help shine an international light on the amazing music that comes out of this region.
“Angine de Poitrine have really perfected the combination of incredible musicianship and concept, and in this business, it always just hits a bit more satisfying when you can bring the weird to the masses.”Music Business Worldwide