Creative Forces Podcast with Guy Kilty

In 2010 Oliver Jones founded Deer Shed Festival, a family-focused music, arts and science weekend camping festival in North Yorkshire, with his wife Kate. Since then, it’s gone on to become one of the best family-friendly festivals in the UK and celebrated its tenth anniversary this year. Oliver spent more than a decade working in the music industry in Bristol and London, which included playing at Glastonbury and studio engineering for Massive Attack, and ended up working in all sorts of jobs before setting up Deer Shed. In this honest and funny interview, which was recorded in front of a live audience at the Podcast Social Club (which he also founded) in Thirsk, hear Oliver describe the ups and downs of setting up a festival, the highs and lows of the music business, and the joys of heading down a YouTube wormhole.

Andrew McMillan is a poet and lecturer in creative writing. His debut collection, physical, published in 2015, won a host of prizes and was the first poetry collection to win the Guardian First Book Award. Earlier this year, it was voted one of the top 25 poetry books of the past 25 years by the Booksellers Association. Growing up in Darfield, south Yorkshire, Andrew spent his early years looking to go into politics, but switched to poetry in his late teens. In this interview hear Andrew describe why he decided politics wasn’t right for him, how he dealt with the merry-go-round of awards ceremonies when his first book took off, and the influence his dad Ian had on his career.

Joanne Harris is the author of more than a dozen novels, most famously Chocolat, which was made into an Oscar-nominated film starring Juliette Binoche and Johnny Depp. Born in Barnsley, Joanne started writing at an early age and worked as a teacher for over a decade before the success of Chocolat allowed her to become a full-time writer. Her books are now published in over 50 countries and have won a number of British and international awards. In this interview, hear why Joanne never thought she could earn a living as an author until Chocolat’s success, why her brief stint as an accountant was ‘like being in a Terry Gilliam film’, and how she and her bandmates have managed to stay together for more than three decades.

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John Nicholson is a football writer, novelist and web entrepreneur. Born in Hull and raised in Stockton-on-Tees, John has enjoyed a wide-ranging career which includes setting up the online t-shirt businesses DJTees & TShirts365, submitting a weekly column for Football365 for almost two decades, and writing 16 novels. His 2010 book We Ate All The Pies was long-listed for the William Hill Sports Book of the Year and he’s been short-listed for Writer of the Year by the Football Supporters Federation. Along the way he’s lived in over 20 locations including The Black Isle in Scotland and Laguna Beach, California. In this brutally honest and funny interview, hear John talk about his love of rock and roll, vinyl records and Middlesbrough FC, how he fell into writing professionally by accident, and how he found out he is related to William the Conqueror.

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Matthew Cope is a magician and magic teacher who performs under the name Matthew J Magic. Growing up in Yorkshire, Matthew started juggling at the age of 10, performing magic as a street entertainer at 14 and was playing all over the country as a magical illusion act just a year later. Now, after a stint as a school teacher and extensive travel around the world, he’s a full-time entertainer, performing his unique combination of magic and variety to audiences around the UK and beyond. In this interview, hear Matthew describe why he became fascinated with magic and variety from such a young age, why he loves travelling, and how his Grandad helped him fulfil his ambitions.

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Rebecca Swift is global head of creative insights at the world-renowned photo agency Getty Images. Since joining the photography industry over 20 years ago, Rebecca has pioneered the use of analytics to find out why we are attracted to certain images rather than others, and been instrumental in ensuring Getty’s stock photographs portray women and people with disabilities in realistic ways, including the banning of photoshopped body shapes. In this interview hear how Rebecca got into the industry by accident, how it’s been revolutionised completely by technology in the last two decades, and which musical instrument she plays to relax.

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Rahaf Harfoush is a best-selling author who focuses on the impact of digital technologies on society and working life. Born in Syria, Rahaf grew up in Canada and became fascinated by digital technology as a teenager, particularly social media and blogging. Her first book, Yes We Did: An Insider’s Look at How Social Media Built the Obama Brand, chronicled her experiences as a member of Barack Obama’s digital media team during the 2008 Presidential election and explored how social networking revolutionised political campaign strategy. Her second book, Hustle and Float: Reclaim Your Creativity and Thrive in a World Obsessed with Work, looks at the ways the endless hustle of the digital world is affecting our mental and physical health and our creativity. In this interview hear how Rahaf felt scared at first when she moved to Canada and couldn’t understand what people were saying, what it was like working on the 2008 Obama campaign, and why she kicks off her day by watching comedy.

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Emma Kennedy is a best -selling author, TV writer, actor and presenter. After growing up in Stevenage and Hitchen then studying at Oxford University, where she met and performed with comedians Richard Herring and Stewart Lee, Emma spent three years as a solicitor before quitting to become a full-time writer. Since then she’s written for and starred in TV shows like Goodness Gracious Me, This Morning With Richard Not Judy, The Smoking Room and Late Lunch with Mel Giedroyc and Sue Perkins, as well as The Kennedys, a BBC comedy series based on her childhood. Her first book, How To Bring Up Your Parents, came out in 2007 and her second, The Tent, The Bucket and Me, about her family camping holidays, appeared two years later. Since then she’s written eight more, including the Wilma Tenderfoot series of children’s books. In among all that she’s also won Celebrity Masterchef and Celebrity Mastermind. In this interview, hear how Emma defied all expectations to get to Oxford, why she knew instantly she’d made a big mistake becoming a lawyer, and why she has a new-found love of Lego.

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Greig Johnson is a comedy writer, performer, musician and filmmaker. His comic creations include Belgian action star Lunge Dolphin, music production guru Woody Brown and northern poet Brian McMorley, and he has recently appeared in BBC Two’s The Mash Report and CBBC’s Class Dismissed. After growing up in Harrogate, Greig studied and then went onto teach graphic art and design in Leeds. At the same time, he was making short films and comedy sketches and when one caught the eye of comedian Matt Lucas, Greig’s career path started to shift. In this very funny interview, hear how Greig’s first comedy videos were made for just two of his friends, the sheer terror he felt the first time he performed his characters on stage, and why his biggest comedy inspiration may well be his Dad.

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Ian McMillan is a well-renowned and much-loved poet, journalist, playwright, and broadcaster. Known as ‘the bard of Barnsley’, his warmth, humour and way with words shine through in his books, regular TV and radio appearances, and frequent tweets. Still resident in his native South Yorkshire, he’s also held the position of poet-in-residence for a wide range of organisations including Barnsley FC and Humberside Police. In this open and often hilarious interview, hear Ian explain how he discovered being a poet who could be funny could be a big advantage, why the freelance lifestyle means he is always saying ‘yes’, and why he loves performing in village halls.

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This episode is brought to you by Right Angles.