The Transition Show, Interview with Rob Hopkins

A special show to celebrate the launch of the new ‘Transition Companion’ book, featuring an interview with the author and co-founder of the Transition Movement, Rob Hopkins – down the line from Transition Town Totnes.

Due to some technical issues at Stroud FM, we sadly don’t have the first 15 minutes of this show available for listen again. As Stroud FM’s recording equipment wasn’t working at the start of the show, the show begins mid-way through Rob’s first musical choice – Losing My Edge byLCD Soundsystem – chosen partly because it namechecks some of the bands Rob didn’t have time to play tracks by. You canread about what happened in the quarter hour that wasn’t recorded below, and see a full list of the tunes Rob chose and we played further below…)

There is, of course, plenty worth listening to in the hour and forty-five minutes you can listen to!

Presenters James Beecher and Helen Royall interview Rob Hopkins for an hour – putting to him questions asked by listeners to the Transition Show and members of Transition Stroud, and Rob makes some ‘desert island discs’-style musical choices.

After the interview with Rob, we are joined by Transition Stroud member Greg Dance, and discuss an article linking the current ‘Occupy’ movement with environmental issues, the latest news on the Feed-in-Tariff scheme for renewable energy, Fukushima radioactivity, and council preparedness for flooding and the relevance of this to local community resilience.

What’s missing in that 15 minutes that wasn’t recorded? Well, we introduced Rob Hopkins – noting that he is the co-founder of Transition Town Totnes and of the Transition Network – which grew out of many years experience in education, teaching permaculture and natural building, and setting up the first 2 year full-time permaculture course in the world, at Kinsale Further Education College in Ireland, as well as co-ordinating the first eco-village development in Ireland to be granted planning permissio. Rob has also won various awards, including the winner of the 2009 Observer Ethical Award for the Grassroots Campaigner category, and his blog is great (http://transitionculture.org) – indeed it was recently voted the 4th best green blog in the UK.

In response to our usual questions about how people came to be involved in Transition and green issues more generally, Rob explained that he first went on a Permaculture course in 1992, and had been involved in the protests against the Government’s massive road-building campaign in the 1990s – but found that they energy involved in these types of protest could lead to people becoming burnt out.

Going back a little further, Rob thought it was probably punk music that first got him interested in political issues – nuclear campaigning following support for CND that many bands expressed at the time… this brought us neatly onto Rob’s first musical choice, which he explained he chose partly because it namechecks many of the bands he didn’t have time to play tunes by (but also because it’s a great track!)

This show is dedicated to John Peel – a radio broadcasting and musical hero, who died 7 years ago this week. Without him, James is pretty certain the Transition Show wouldn’t exist.

Rob’s Transition Town Tunes:
Losing My Edge by LCD Soundsystem
You Could Easily Have Me by Metronomy
Casimir Pulaski Day by Sufjan Stevens
Moonshake by Can
I Can Feel You Love by Felice Taylor
The Pledge by DJ Spooky and Saul Williams
Sure Nuff N Yes I Do by Captain Beefheart
Moan by Trentemoller

One other musical track featured: Apple of my eye by The Upholsterers (for Transition Marlborough’s Apple Day).

Follow the transition show on twitter (@transitionshow), or see the links we mention on the show by visiting our site here: www.twitter.com/transitionshow.

You can also follow Rob Hopkins on twitter (@robintransition)…

Find out more about Transition Stroud here: www.transitionstroud.org

Download MP3 (97 MB | 106:10 min)

The Transition Show