The Swell Season's Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová: "We’re singing from a different place, because our relationship has deepened and broadened"

I may have a face for radio but one of my highlights last year was getting to serve as roving reporter on the Hot Press and Virgin Media One TV show, Uprising. Over four seriously action-packed episodes, I think we did a pretty good job of reflecting the vibrancy and diversity of the current Irish music scene.

From Denise Chaila, Hozier and The Academic to The Coronas, Nell Mescal and Pillow Queens, everybody played their hearts out and gave good quote. None more so than Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová, AKA The Swell Season, who invited us to their Dublin reunion show in Vicar Street.

What was supposed to be a quick chat for the cameras turned into an hour-long epic during which Glen and Markéta reflected on their remarkable Oscar-winning, Simpsons-cameoing career together.

To celebrate the July 11 release of their third Forward album – our man John Walshe credits it with having “a surfeit of beauty” – here’s how it all went down...

STUART: Glen, Vicar Street has some special memories for you, doesn’t it?

GLEN: With The Frames, we did like one night in Whelan’s, then two nights, then three and then five. It was then that we stepped up to Vicar Street which is this kind of grander, broader room. Ever since we came here – God, I can’t remember what year that was – we started doing shows around Christmas and it became a real thing. Actually, I couldn’t remember if The Swell Season had done Vicar Street before…

MARKÉTA: Yeah, I thought so, but I’ve had three children since and my memory is not what it used to be!

S: You also chose to rehearse for your tour here.

G: Yeah, we love the room. It’s a very comfortable place and in the middle of Dublin, so everyone can be kind of close by. There’s a lovely thing that happens where people turn up early at like two o’clock in the afternoon and we’ll throw the doors open and let them come in to the soundcheck. It’s fascinating to watch a band figure stuff out with the crew. Like the lights and the sound and all of the discussion that goes on. It’s almost like breaking the fourth wall. You’re kind of semi-performing because you know that there are people there who are interested.

S: I saw about six people come in who I assumed were your family. They were hugging each other and generally behaving like kids at Christmas. Is it muscle memory with the old songs or do you have to do a bit of rehearsing to remember the subtleties?

M: Some songs are definitely just engraved in my memory. ‘Falling Slowly’ being the top one on the list. Other ones take a little bit of rehearsing – and then there are some that need way more rehearsing. It’s nice not to rely on muscle memory because sometimes when you’re performing you go on autopilot, which is undesirable. You really want to stay present as much as possible. But also, one gig is worth five rehearsals, wouldn’t you say?

G: For sure. You learn through your mistakes. At a gig, the audience may not notice you’ve made a mistake but sometimes you’ll misstep a lyric or… Markéta’s songs tend to move around a lot chordal-y and time-wise they shift. During them, I’m super-alert because I don’t want to get it wrong. But it’s those moments where you do get it wrong that are like, “You’re never going to get that wrong again!” It’s beaten straight into you.

S: With the older songs, do you stick religiously to the original versions or do you find them subtly or quite profoundly changing? And do they mean different things to you now?

G: Yes to all of those! The songs do change. Also, they change with the personnel. Like we have a new drummer now and Joe from The Frames on bass. Whenever we play something as an ensemble, it takes on a different feeling. And, of course, we’re singing from a different place too, because our relationship has deepened and broadened. Sometimes there’s a bit of sadness in a lyric, but I like to take that now and transform it into the positive of things. And there are certain songs we wrote back then that are actually just too sad. Yesterday, I suggested a song and Markéta just said “No!” And I totally understand why, like, “We’re not going there!”

S: So The Swell Season is a total democracy?

G: It now is. Before, it was me kind of leading the way because during Once I was helping Mar with her songs and then she was contributing to mine. Whereas now it’s gone to another place where Mar’s songs are really strong. She comes in with them, they’re done. I’m like, “Wow!” and do my best to try and keep up.

S: I heard you rehearsing a beautiful new song, ‘The Answer Is Yes’. How was that conjured up?

M: I was sitting at the piano and just thinking, “I’d love to write a song for me and Glen to sing together.” One that sort of summarises what has happened during all these years and where we are now; kind of celebrating that in a way which is personal but at the same time universal. It was one of those songs that came very quickly. I sent Glen a voice memo of it sort of half-written and was like, “Can you work on this with me?” But he was busy at the time and I just went and finished it.

G: I was on tour in LA with Eddie Vedder when you sent that to me. I decided to write a song in response, which was ‘Only Love Remains’. The lyrics were something like: “Despite the fire damage and the broken nose / The heartache and the broken home / Only love remains, only love.” It was a bit of a fun kind of thing, like all of the (metaphorical) punch-ups.

So we said, “Why don’t we try to finish these songs off and sing them on the tour?” I was to write the second verse on ‘The Answer Is Yes’, but the next time I got in touch with Mar, she’d finished it. So then I decided I’d go to Iceland and stay in Mar’s place with her, Mio and the kids and finish the two songs. We sat down and said, “Here’s how my one goes.” By the end of the day we’d racked up 18 bits of songs. I was like, “Ah, okay.” That creative thing only happens with Mar.

I remember the first time I sat down with Mar and sang her a song. It would have been one for The Frames. She said, “Did this happen to you?” I was like, “Well, no.” And she said, “Well, why are you singing it?” And I went, “Bam!” Make your work about your life.

S: To me, ‘The Answer Is Yes’ sounds like a companion piece to ‘Falling Slowly’. The lives you’ve lived since…

M: That’s a really great compliment, thank you.

S: It also reminds me in the best possible way of ABBA in their gentler moments. Are you an ABBA fan?

M: Yeah, of course.

S: Amongst the pop bangers, they had some amazingly raw songs.

G: Yeah, oh, that’s very kind.

M: They do what Glen was just mentioning now. They draw on their own personal close experiences – and in that sense, they become universal. There’s a great strength to that.

G: And when the lyric is true, it lands.

S: The punters can tell, can’t they?

G: Listeners are very intelligent.

S: Another lovely thing you do is have up-and-coming acts support you. How did you discover Leah Moran, who’s playing tonight, and Dylan Harcourt who’s on tomorrow?

M: Leah is somebody I saw busking on Grafton Street in December when I came over. She was there with her gloves on, playing the guitar. She has this kind of Billie Eilish vibe and I thought she was very talented. I was also impressed how committed she was because it was freezing, you know? I was doing a bit of Christmas shopping and kept walking back and forth. I ended up taking a photograph of her and posting it so we connected through Instagram. The talent on the streets of Dublin is overwhelming.

G: For the last ten years we’ve been doing the Christmas Busk on Grafton Street and then it moved to the Gaiety. Evey time Dylan would come with a bunch of his mates. His songs are just getting better and better and better and I’d love to see him get discovered on a broader level.

S: What I love about the busk is that, whether you’re an unknown or a global superstar, everyone’s treated equally.

G: Yeah, you’ve got Bono, who’s probably the most famous musician in the country, if not the world, hanging out with Dylan. Or he’s hanging out with myself or Hozier. One year I was like, “Who’s the fella in the red hat? God, he’s brilliant!” and somebody said, “His name is Dermot Kennedy.” Fair play to Bono, he would often-times invite us all back to his to hang out with him. We’d all go back and sit and have a sing-song.

S: It’s unbelievably nineteen years since the release of your The Swell Season debut. What are your overriding memories of making it, Mar?

M: The friendships between myself and Glen and (Once film director) John Carney and our friend David Cleary, who took the stills. I remember those moments of grabbing a cup of tea or a slice of pizza around Grafton Street, and just having chats about movies and music. It was such a different environment from my day-to-day. I was in high school in a small town and to be in Dublin doing a creative project with these artists was mind-blowing. I kept pinching myself that this was happening to me.

S: Writing ‘Falling Slowly’, did you know it was special?

G: It’s a good question because there are songs you write where there’s almost a slight embarrassment. Where I go, “Is this any good? Is it a bit cheesy?” I love ‘Falling Slowly’ and I’ll stand by and fight for it, but you could imagine a boy band singing it almost. You’ve written a song that is a little bit out of my normal kind of safety space. It was in the Czech Republic that Markéta played piano on it. I remember going in to your parents and playing it to them after we recorded it. Mar sang this note on the chorus – ‘Take this sinking boat and point it home / We still have time.” She went “time” and I went “time”. I went up for that falsetto and there was just something in the moment…

John Carney heard us play it in Whelan’s and was like, “I’ve got a whole scene for that song” which was the Walton’s piano shop one. You get a sense sometimes with a song or an idea where you go, “This doesn’t feel like it’s coming from me.” I don’t know what I’m trying to say but it feels like it’s kind of from a different place.

M: It was like a gift, really, because it arrived so quickly. All of a sudden it was just there and we were really excited by it. It was like, “Wow!” Especially for me, it was one of the first songs we’d written together. The really telling thing was to hear people’s responses to it. We’d played it at the concerts in Czechia that summer and people always mentioned ‘Falling Slowly’. It really touched them in some way. I’ve come to sort of know and spot the songs that really resonate.

G: There’s a touch of ‘lightening in a bottle’. It’s just another simple song you’ve come up with, but it has a little something that sparks, it lands.

S: What were your initial reactions when John Carney came to you and said, “I’ve got this idea for a film called Once”?

G: John’s a brilliant mind and has loads of ideas. So when he comes and says, “I have an idea for a film”, you’re like, “Yeah, of course you do. Because you always have an idea for a film.” Anyway, he says, “I have this idea, it’s called Busker.” That’s what Once was originally called. “It’s about a busker who meets this Eastern European woman who’s selling flowers on the street.” We were going through this thing where a huge influx of Eastern Europeans were coming in to Ireland. There was a bit of poetic licence because Markéta’s character was a bit more Romanian than Czech. Although Czechia could be considered Eastern Europe, it’s Central Europe.

M: It was okay because I wasn’t playing a Czech, I was playing a girl. Her nationality wasn’t really important.

S: Does winning an Oscar and appearing on The Simpsons feel a bit surreal?

M: Yeah, absolutely.

G: 100% When someone says it to you, you’re like, “Oh, wow, that’s mental!” I remember we were playing in Tucson, Arizona with Calexico and got a call from The Simpsons saying, “Matt’s written a little spoof. Do you guys want to jump on a train and come up and do it?” Do you remember that train ride? It was an overnight train to Los Angeles. When we got there they were all just sitting around and we did a read-through. It was fantastic. Then we went down to the recording studio, read through it again a couple of times and then got back on the train.

S: I’ve spoken to a couple of Oscar winners who say their memory of the night is very hazy. Again, is there something in particular about it which sticks in your mind?

M: Definitely the moment when our names were called out. From that point on, it was like a new mode got activated. We were already so joyful to be there and get to play that song. Standing on that stage, it was definitely the high point of our life.

G: Markéta had said to me earlier on in the day, “Look, on the crazy off-chance that we do end up winning, you say a couple of things and I’ll just go ‘thank you.’” When the moment came, I was like blah, blah, blah, blah. I don’t know what I said. And then we were pulled off stage; Markéta didn’t get to speak. Jon Stewart came over and was like, “Come on, come with me.” And he pulled Mar away from me. Suddenly while I was hugging janitors, she was on the other side of the stage and gave this most incredibly eloquent ‘thank you’ speech. You were brilliant. Fair play to Jon Stewart, it was a sweet thing to do.

S: A few years ago when I was interviewing Billie Eilish at Electric Picnic, she was uber nervous because she was meeting this guy called Glen Hansard backstage. She was quoting chunks of Once, which she’d watched a zillion times on the tour bus, to me. Billie asked, “Is he nice” and I said, “Yeah, he’s a decent skin.” How did you two get on?

G: We had an absolute ball. I’d gotten a call basically asking “Do you want to come down?” from her mother. I was like, “Oh man, really? That’s incredible. Can I bring my niece?” Because my niece was just freaking out. By the time we got down to the Picnic, there were about eight of us. We all went in and Finneas and Billie were just so sweet. Big hug, photos. It was a bit like meeting me and Mar during that crazy Once period. They were kind of rabbits in the headlights, but they were also quite grounded and their parents were with them.

Billie was like, “We just met Barbara Broccoli. She asked us to do the Bond song!’” Which is funny because Barbara produced Once on Broadway. Billie said she’d grown up listening to Mar’s songs, ‘The Hill’, ‘If You Want Me’ and ‘Say It To Me Now’. She was like, “You guys are the first music I heard.” And Finneas was, “Yep, I was a huge fan and playing your music constantly in the house.’”

S: Guys, you collaborated last year on a Ukrainian Action fundraising single called ‘Take Heart’. What’s the background to that?

G: Again, I was on the West Coast of America with Eddie Vedder and the Earthlings. We got news that Russia had invaded Ukraine and were all in shock. It felt like the world was about to end in a way. We didn’t really know how to respond. I just sat down with my guitar… Whenever I’m confused or lost, I usually go to my instruments. It’s where I find solace.

At the same time, I picked up my phone and there was a post from Patti Smith on Instagram from a few days previous. She was on stage in one of her amazing, shamanic, wild modes and said, “People, take heart, it will get better.” I remember going, “Oh, wow, that’s a great line.” So, I began to muse on that on my guitar. And then when it became a song, I reached out to Patti and asked her, “Would it be okay?”

And she said, “Did I say that? I was probably just in a moment. You’re more than welcome to it. Take it with my blessing.” I was at home one night in Dublin and there was this great documentary about Aslan. Christy had reached out to people at the Red Cross and put together a band of Ukrainian singers to sing ‘Crazy World’.

I asked Christy – actually, it was the last conversation we had – about putting me in touch with the Red Cross people he’d spoken to and we managed to get three young women to come in and sing the ”Return to me, return to me, return to me unharmed” verse in Ukrainian. The song is kind of a prayer to those who are going to fight from their loved ones.

The Ukrainian spirit’s really something. They came and sang and afterwards I asked Markéta for some pointers – where the song worked and didn’t work. I remember sending it to Bono who said, “What about this for an end?” And he sent me this beautiful melodic line. He said, “Don’t put my name on it.” So he’s on the track but not named.

M: I just thought it was a lovely gesture. My family were hosting a family of Ukrainian refugees at their place these past couple of years. Czech people felt a huge need to reach out and try and help because it’s easy for us to imagine being the ones in that position. If it can happen in Ukraine, it can happen anywhere.

• Forward is out on Friday, July 11.