Mark Redfern (Under the Radar): I have a couple of questions if you don't mind.

Kevin: Oh, here we go. Is this a threesome?

Mark: It's a threesome. Cillian, I was wondering when you first discovered Broken Social Scene.

Cillian: That's a very good question, actually. I think it was probably through the Feist album and then loving that album so much, doing a bit of research and then going backwards from there. I think that's how it came about.

Mark: What other current bands are you into?

Kevin: Yeah, you know, I forgot, I wanted to say, because you're an indie rock guy, "Give us your bands."

Cillian: The bands that I'm liking at the moment are ... God, let me think. I always get put on the spot with this. I really love that solo album that Gruff Rhys put out from the Super Furry Animals. That's an amazing album, I love it. I'm really liking this record by the guy who's from Kings of Convenience. The Whitest Boy Alive, I think.

Kevin: The Whitest Boy Alive, yeah.

Cillian: It's a great album. And Midlake, I'm really liking their new album.

Kevin: Fantastic!

Cillian: There's this Irish band you should check out called Republic of Loose. Have you ever heard of those guys?

Kevin: I haven't. Mark, have you heard of them?

Mark: No, I haven't heard of them.

Cillian: I would do a little Google on those guys and see if you can listen to them.

Mark: Cillian, I was wondering if there were any musicians that you would want to play if they did some sort of biopic or something.

Cillian: Oh God, you know, I've been offered a couple of those and I always am very wary of them because I just think, "Listen to the music," you know? And particularly, they did a Brian Jones [of the Rolling Stones] movie."

Kevin: And it didn't do well.

Cillian: You know, he wasn't a very nice person and there's not that much of a story. And I know they're doing an Ian Curtis [of Joy Division] picture and I talked to them about that. But again, I don't know, there's such a huge amount of pressure and a huge amount of people have invested so much in Ian Curtis and his music and everything else, that it'd have to be a very, very special script for me to get involved. And you know, the good music biopics, you can name them on one hand, really. And there's been so many crap ones. So I'm very kind of anxious about approaching those.

Mark: You said you used to be in bands. Do you still play music? Do you have any aspirations to still do music?

Cillian: I mess around on the guitar for my own enjoyment and I play to my little boy. And I sometimes get together with the guys and play at fuckin' weddings or something. But, not in a serious way at all.

Mark: And Kevin, when did you first discover Cillian Murphy, was that through 28 Days Later...?

Kevin: It was, which I didn't see for a long time, because I wasn't into zombie movies. But then someone finally sat me down with one of their deluxe super home systems and said, "We're gonna do this tonight," and got me very high and I enjoyed it very much.

Cillian: [Laughs] That's the way to watch it, man.

Kevin: Yeah, and I'd never seen you before and you just, immediately, it was one of those like, "Who's that peculiar looking cute boy in this movie?" And then, you know, here we are.

Mark: Kevin, your solo record, what kind of vibe is that compared to Broken Social Scene? Obviously I imagine it's a lot more stripped down?

Kevin: At times it is. But it's also very similar. I might be attacked, but the only reason it's a solo record is because I got to do whatever I wanted and I sang. I find a lot of bands, if there's a band leader who wants to do something, he just sort of takes that band and grinds it down and does his own things with what they created and I, by no means, want to do that with Social Scene. And our next record, I think, is gonna be even more of a collective vibe. I kind of felt last record was getting a little too heavy on my side of the things with my voice and everything. So I just wanted to go and get a bunch of stuff out of my system that I needed to. And it was only made in the most honest [way], I just hung out at my friend's house on and of for a couple years. My friend Ohad Benchetrit and I made it with the Do Make [Say Think] boys, Charles Spearin and Ohad. So it wasn't really anything except doing it for honest reasons. And then it was like, "Okay, I guess we'll put this out." And we didn't know if it was gonna be Social Scene at first. So there's a lot of similarities, but yes, at times it's very coherent and you can hear and there's not eight million things going on.

Mark: Right, but it's not just you and an acoustic guitar or anything like that?

Kevin: No, not at all. The whole band's there. I got to play with a lot of people that I wanted to play with. You know, there's a lot of guests which I have yet to really figure out how I'm gonna go about doing that. I think I'll just probably do it quietly, instead of saying, "Hey," with a big sticker and all that bullshit. That was done really sweetly, too. These people that I love just came and played on it. So, this is basically something where I didn't have to turn to anyone and say, "Is it okay if we, is it okay if I, is it okay?" I just got, at some points, to play everything. And at other points, come and ask people to play little things. I was thinking today, in the two years that I was recording there on and off, I smoked one joint. All I did was hang out with my friend's kid, eat nice meals, and his family took me in. Just drank some wine and made a record, and basically in the daytime. All anti-rock and roll, you know.

Cillian: That's very cool.

Kevin: Home by seven, you know. [Laughs]

Mark: I was rereading the article we did on you around the time of that last record [Broken Social Scene] today and that just seemed like such a crazy time consuming process to make that record, with all the different mixes you had.

Cillian: How long did it take to make?

Kevin: It would've took [less time], but we fooled around. Basically, we had so much freedom that we made ourselves very claustrophobic. You Forgot It In People was made where the band was playing in a basement about a year before we went and recorded anyways, and played a bunch of live shows. This last record was made while we were semi-jamming on tour and then kind of semi-recording while we were in the studio, or people just coming in and playing on top of ideas. So in terms of being this big band, we didn't really go in and write together. We just kind of separately came up with stuff. Or we had ideas and Newfeld was really much like, "Hey, let's try this and try that." David Newfeld, who is our producer, who—both of you, I'll tell you a side note—he just did the Super Furry Animals record. Yeah, so the new one is gonna be produced by Super Furry Animals and David Newfeld, and I've heard a bunch, it's pretty crazy.

Cillian: I'd say so.

Kevin: So yeah, I'll never go back there again. We just kind of lost it. But it's very exhausting, believing half the shit. We were supposed to come out with a big slammer, you know, we were supposed to come out and I don't know, try to do things. But instead, we kind of went against that and tried to make an art record. And I still stand by everything we did. But I think we got lost a bit in only thinking about that for so long.

Cillian: But, listen, I have to say, that's my favorite album in the last two years, definitely.

Kevin: Good. Well, it all works. It all works.

Cillian: In the end.

Mark: Yeah, it was Under the Radar's number one album of the year, that year.

Kevin: Oh really? That's right! You guys, from the beginning, have been, to every friend of mine, pretty fantastic ... And that piece, they did a whole piece, Cillian, on Canadian music.

Cillian: Yeah, I saw that edition.

Kevin: Yeah, that was incredible.

Cillian: And the Canadian government flew, that's what you were saying, Mark, that they flew you up to Canada?

Mark: Yeah, they paid for Wendy and I to fly up to Canada to do the whole thing.

Cillian: What a great government, huh?

Mark: Yeah, it's pretty cool.

Kevin: You know, "What a great government." I cannot argue with you in terms of how their arts programs are set up.

Cillian: Yeah, listen, I know nothing else [about the Canadian government] besides that.

Kevin: No, no, no, but I mean I look around and I see we're constantly battling for them. Constantly, constantly battling for them. But even having one program, we seem to be better off than many, many, many places. And we have a few. I know personally in my last record, I got thirty thousand dollars from a government-owned, government-run program called Factor. You gotta pay it back, but it works in your advantage. You just have to pay it back through Canadian sales. And, I mean soon that's—because record sales are dying—soon it's gonna be like, "Shit, can't really come up with the cash, guys." [Laughs] But no, we're fortunate. We are. I kept that [Under the Radar issue]. I told my parents, this issue, this will be something that you want to show your grandkids or something, because there's so much crap you do, but when you come across something that was genuine and I thought that was really, really a genuine, sweet—you captured a time, basically.

Mark: Cool, well thank you. That was our intention, definitely ... Well, I don't have any other questions.

Kevin: All right guys, great threesome. I had fun.

Cillian: Yeah, me too.

***

These bonus quotes jump in as Drew and Murphy are discussing an interesting source of funding for Irish cinema.

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Kevin Drew: That's probably one of the beautiful things about the Irish mob is that they will put [money] towards making a great beautiful, lovely art film like Breakfast on Pluto.

Cillian Murphy: [Laughs] The Irish mob. There are actually beginning to be private investors in Ireland who are seeing that you can put some money into movies like this. It gives you a bit of cachet and you might be lucky and get something back.

Kevin: Exactly, the parties are good.

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Kevin: Was [The Wind That Shakes the Barley] an all Irish film set kind of thing?

Cillian: Yeah, what [Ken Loach] does, if you look at any of his films, he just casts from the area he's shooting in, so all the actors have it in their DNA and they're not putting on an accent. I mean this is the second film only I've ever done in my own accent. And everyone in the movie is from Cork.

Kevin: Was that shot in Cork?

Cillian: Yeah. All around the locale.

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Kevin: I spoke to someone and they thought [The Wind That Shakes the Barley] was very violent. I did not find it violent at all, in terms of what the fuck is out there. And I think that's a very obvious thing to say. But I actually found it, there was something very calm about it, the way that it was shot, right down to just the soundtrack itself. I thought it delivered everything very beautifully. So, I think you and the cast, and especially the director, you all did a very wonderful job and I hope people see it. And I don't know, I saw it, I had the flu. It just makes it more sensitive and real when you completely can't get off the couch.

Cillian: Yeah, well I think Americans, and I know you're not American, but…

Kevin: That's okay, I am. [Laughs]

Cillian: [Laughs] But that again when you mention the IRA or anything like that, they just think of the Provisional IRA and what happened in the North of Ireland. But I think this film will hopefully—it's not meant to be an education, because you can't take your history lessons from movies, but—it should at least open people's eyes a little bit more to what actually happened and why the country was in the state it was in for many, many years.

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Cillian: And can you just talk a little bit about you guys doing soundtracks and stuff? Because I know you did the Half Nelson sound track, is that right?

Kevin: Yeah, they came to us. We got a call that some film was using 15 of our already recorded songs and it was one of those things where you were like, "No way!" And then we saw the film and there was absolutely no way we could not do it, we just loved the movie so much. And the way they used the music.

Cillian: And it did so well, huh?

Kevin: Yeah.

Cillian: I haven't seen it yet. I haven't got a chance to see it.

Kevin: Yeah, you should, it's very good. And the guy is really good.

Cillian: Ryan Gosling is a great actor.

Kevin: And he just got that [Oscar] nomination. And it was really well done. They were such sweet people, Ryan [Fleck] and Anna [Boden] who produced it, directed it and wrote it. It's a film made by humans about humans and that's what we're kind of into doing soundtracks to. That's why we ended up doing Snow Cake and how we met [producer] Gina [Carter]. It's just that there are so many of them, the name is becoming a bit of an institution or a brand. I mean there's a soundtrack that was just done that I had nothing to do with and it went under Broken Social Scene because Brendan did it. With Charles in it. But people come up to me and they're like, "Hey, I heard you're doing that [soundtrack]."

Cillian: Is it a fluid number of members in the group or how many does it officially stand at then?

Kevin: Well it's always been a fluid number of members….I don't know what the fuck is going on. All I know is that yeah, we're friends, Cillian. It was all friendship and that's how it started and then now we're just kind of regrouping.

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Mark Redfern (Under the Radar): Are there any fictional characters that you're dying to play? Either from literary sources or from comic books or old TV shows or anything like that? Is there anything that sticks out?

Cillian: I wish I had an original thought there. They all seem to be already bought or made or Leonardo DiCaprio's doing them. These big studios just have people in their literary department and in publishing houses and all the comic books are all bought up. It's very hard to find an original idea that hasn't been bought. But I keep looking.

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Mark: Cillian, you'd done movies before [28 Days Later...], but that was really the one that kind of launched you.

Cillian: That was the first one that anyone saw, really. And it was the first one with an established director. So that film means a lot to me because, well, I'm very proud of it and also it opened a lot of doors and people began to be able to pronounce my fuckin' name, you know.

Mark: Right. Is there an actor that you kind of look up to, in terms of how their career path goes?

Cillian: There are a lot of them. But I stopped naming them, because it gets a bit embarrassing. And then you end up meeting them and you feel like a bit of an idiot. And there's so many, it's the obvious ones I think, both living and dead. But it's funny, I get way more excited or nervous or flustered when I meet musicians, weirdly.

Mark: You seem to have this interesting career where you're doing these Hollywood movies and then the independent movies. Are you going to try and keep doing that? Or do you see a time when you're going to get swallowed up by Hollywood?

Cillian: I hope not. I mean for me it's just about the stories that are worth telling and it doesn't matter if they're within the Hollywood system or outside of it, because there's good and bad movies made in both systems.

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Cillian: Now what's [your solo album] going to be called?

Kevin: I'm not sure. And I've already gone through this, Cillian, where you go, "I think it's gonna be called this." And then they start printing that. And then you change it.

Mark: Yeah, I remember we did an interview with you where you named the third Social Scene album as Windsurfing Nation.

Kevin: And it should have remained that.

Mark: We printed that and everybody was referring to it as that for a year, because it was a year before it came out. And then, of course, you changed it to a self-titled album.

Cillian: There's a song [on the album] called "Windsurfing Nation."

Kevin: I'll never be there again. And I don't know about you, Cillian, but it was one of those points where just everything got too serious with this record. It was just kind of ridiculous and we changed our minds about things so many fucking times.

Cillian: Well it's a fucking great record, man.

Kevin: Yeah, so whatever. In the end, I love it. But yes, Mark, we should have kept that title. I told you what the title was then, and still think it works now. And people still refer to it as Windsurfing Nation.