Kingdom of Birds (KOB) is a Toronto-based grunge-punk trio with roots that stretch back to high school hallways. The band first came together when Asa Berezny was the new kid in town, Beatrice Richard carried the air of a teenage hoodlum, and Annabel Barbon-McGuire lived up to her reputation as queer royalty. What began as a messy, joyful experiment quickly turned into a proper band—and now, five years later, KOB is still powered by the same friendship at its core. Over the years, the band has played more than 100 shows and earned their place on stages alongside Deerhoof, Cumgirl8, and Partner. Their sound is urgent, unpolished, and alive—grunge-punk that thrives on the tension between noisy catharsis and sharp, lived-in storytelling.
Their upcoming album, Vermin (due out February 2026), is their boldest statement yet. One of its defining tracks was born during Asa’s time living in Montreal, after leaving Toronto and dropping out of jazz school. Isolated in the dead of winter, unemployed and heartbroken, Asa spent days writing alone while a strange figure became part of her routine: a naked neighbor he nicknamed Kenny, an older man who spent his days in bed watching porn. “Kenny was this odd, daily presence in my life,” Asa recalls. “I was alone, and so was he. He was strange and sad, and writing about him felt like a way of processing that isolation.”
That mix of honesty, grit, and wry observation has become central to KOB’s music. On Vermin, Asa’s guitar and vocals are backed by Annabel’s bass and harmonies and Bea’s relentless drumming, the three building songs that feel at once raw and communal. Recorded at Albany in Toronto with Elliott Gallagher-Doucette and mastered by Kristian Montano, the album carries both the bite of punk and the intimacy of confessional songwriting. Kingdom of Birds has grown up, but they’ve never lost the restless spark that first brought them together. With Vermin, they’re turning strange stories, personal upheaval, and the messiness of early adulthood into songs that demand to be heard.
