The members of Radius & Helena all live together, possibly in a magical land where creative juices rain from the sky and everybody is both smart and nice. On November 5th they will emerge from this indie rock Narnia to share their articulate hooks and motivating rhythms with Wavelength and with you. Evan Dickson sees drummer Steve Kwok everywhere he goes and took this opportunity to get better acquainted.

Hi Steve, would you like to introduce your band? Which one is Radius and which is Helena?

STEVE: Well the basics are: we're a four piece band and we all live together in our east end house with only occasional conflicts--really nothing that can't be resolved with good old fashion talking. I'm the bitchy one in the family. I throw hissyfits... sometimes. The rest of them are really nice and super easy to live with. Examples: Christopher made me a pinata in my own likeness for my birthday (which, yes, I beat the crap out of). I was really touched. Ryan doesn't get cross when I give my rent in late. He's very understanding about my poverty. And Denise gives good hugs when I'm stressed. That and she shares assorted cured meats that her dad gives her when she visits him.

Raidus & Helena are actually fictional characters from an old 1920's Czech play called R.U.R. (Rossum's Univeral Robots). I only know about it because my bandmates are big sci-fi nerds and gave me a heads up that it was a good read. It was the original "Man makes robots to alleviate his own burden of labour. Robots gain awareness and rebel against their makers" story. Radius was one of the original robots--designed only as a tool. His thinking patterns are very logical, mechanical and technical. Helena is a human character possessed of great compassion and personal insight.

CHRISTOPHER: I have officially laid claim to '˜Radius' as of this interview on the grounds that I do most of the work. No one can match my tireless work ethic and so it is only fitting I be associated with a machine contrived to serve others. It is also in character that I resent such labor.

Is this something I have asked for you might think? Perhaps it is. My open readiness to coordinate, delegate, manage, operate, enforce, and devise makes me a slave to these very tasks. And perhaps most souring of all to me, is that I have somehow come to love such chores. I am plagued with feelings of jealousy and possession whenever someone else tries to help in these endeavors. In things as simple as a poster I have brooded and fumed for days, worried that others cannot possibly live up to my incomparable level of perfection. I have discovered hidden standards in myself regarding almost every outlet of Radius & Helena. And so I toil as much for them as I do for my own sense of self satisfaction. I think it has become rather obvious that I have asked for my bondage, no?

Your official website bio says that Raidus & Helena are storytellers. What are some of the stories your songs tell?

RADIUS: Our songs are the reflections of our own shortcomings most evident between each other. We are a discord of ideas, competing ceaselessly. So the stories we tell are those opposing forces in earnest: How to destroy your love affair without even trying. What makes me need to act like my favourite celebrity? Why is it that when the shit hits the fan, you come to enjoy the company of people uglier than yourself? These songs are not conceived as straight narratives but more as dialogues in which there are many conflicting attitudes. We use Raidus & Helena for these ends. If death is a metal sphere, who are you? If everyone who was ever hurt in a car called William Mattar, would we all get the money we so deserved? ('œHurt-in-a-car? Call-William-Mattar!'? '“no, please don't.)

I think the video advertisement on your myspace website (www.myspace.com/radiushelena) is a work of genius. Is the animation a deliberate homage to Norman McLaren?

RYAN: Three out of our four members come from an animation background, so when we were making the commercial the idea of animating a portion of it just seemed like the natural thing to do. We thought it might be neat to try and emulate some of those old animations you'd see on Sesame Street. The 'œBee Bo Boo Beep'? noises were definitely a nod to McLaren though.

RADIUS: Ryan is correct. The 'œBee Bo Boo Beeps'? are definitely homage.

What would you say you would like to accomplish at Wavelength on November 5th, if asked?

STEVE: I don't think our goal with Wavelength is much different than with other shows we play. We put a lot of effort and care into our songs and it's always nice for us when people can hear what we do--even nicer when people like what they hear.