Angine de Poitrine Sweeps Polaris Music Prize and SOCAN Song Prize

A double Polaris sweep on Massey Hall's stage

Quebec rock duo Angine de Poitrine took home both the 2026 Polaris Music Prize for their album Vol. II and the SOCAN Polaris Song Prize for the track "Fabienk" at the Polaris Concert & Award Ceremony powered by FACTOR at Toronto's Massey Hall on Sept. 22. Two-time Polaris winner Jeremy Dutcher and Tanya van Luven, SOCAN's chief membership officer, announced the wins back-to-back immediately after the duo's live performance of "Fabienk," opening both award cases to find the same name. The ceremony capped a breakout year for the Saguenay, Que., friends, who had earlier won the Billboard Canada Global Breakthrough Award, opened for Jack White, shared a stage with Shania Twain and made British and American late-night appearances after a KEXP performance clip went viral.

Prize structure, voting and short-list competition

The Album Prize carries a $30,000 purse from the Slaight Family Foundation, while the $10,000 Song Prize is split between songwriters and performers. Coverage notes this year's winner was chosen by a voting pool of roughly 200 music industry experts rather than the 11-person jury used in previous editions, with the prize going to the best Canadian record based solely on artistic merit. Vol. II was selected over a short list that included Tanya Tagaq, Les Louanges, Bibi Club, Beverly Glenn-Copeland, Begonia, Peaches, Rochelle Jordan, Charlotte Cornfield and Aquakultre, while "Fabienk" beat out Charlotte Cornfield, Pup, Charlotte Day Wilson, Patrick Watson and Martha Wainwright.

Wordless acceptance from the self-described aliens

Band members Khn and Klek maintained their silent-alien stage persona, taking the stage in black-and-white polka-dot outfits and masks with elongated noses and miming with the vinyl-shaped award rather than speaking, before manager Sébastien Collin stepped forward to thank the nominees. Collin called it "a great year for all the music scene" and said the recognition was unexpected, describing the project as the result of "a lifetime of refinement, collaboration, a drive to push beyond one's limits, and a refusal to be confined by any established framework." The pair, who describe themselves as 333-year-old extraterrestrials, play sophisticated microtonal math rock and have experimented with music since their teens.

Heritage Prize honours Dunn and The Watchmen

The Slaight Family Polaris Heritage Prize, which celebrates albums released before the Polaris Prize existed, went to the late singer-songwriter Willie Dunn for his 1971 self-titled album and to Winnipeg rock band The Watchmen for their 1993 record McLaren Furnace Room. Beverly Glenn-Copeland, who publicly disclosed a dementia diagnosis in 2024, opened the concert alongside wife and collaborator Elizabeth Copeland and a choir.