Chart toppers Rudimental aim for 'seminal' debut album
- Published
Past a creaky wooden door, up a set of twisty stairs and you'll find a dimly-lit cave of carpets, couches and keyboards.
This is Rudimental's east London studio. It's homely. The four members of the group gather round a kitchen table in the centre.
It's a brief break for the band who are working non-stop to apply the finishing touches to their debut album, due out in 2013.
"We pretty much live here at the moment," smiles Piers Agget.
"There's only three sofas here so one person has to sleep on the floor," adds bandmate Amir.
'Dream' collaborations
After starting work together little over 12 months ago, those late nights have more than paid off for the Hackney band.
Their track Feel The Love, first lauded by the dance music world, eventually hit number one in June.
"It was written in Kesi's mum's basement, but this is where it was created and turned into the hit," smiles Amir Amor.
Piers adds: "The first time we heard Feel The Love we all started dancing and taking our clothes off. There's a video which we may put online at some point."
They say it was only when they made their TV debut on Later…With Jools Holland in October that this year's achievements began to sink in.
"I was a bit of a fan boy to Damon Albarn (who was also performing)," concedes Amir. "I just said it straight away - I said, 'I love you man. Do you want to do a track with us?' He was like, 'Sorry, who are you?'"
While Damon hasn't come back yet, surely others will. Rudimental have drawn up a wish list of collaborators for the future.
"I think Lauryn Hill. I think Kesi is on the phone with her. Not really," winks Amir. "Sade for me - I'd love to work with her. Bobby Womack too."
"At the same time we do like working with up and coming artists," says Kesi. "(Feel The Love vocalist) John Newman we first heard him singing in a pub."
Sheeran love
Ed Sheeran recently expressed his desire to launch a side project with them - an idea they're enthusiastic about.
"We love Ed, and we love what he's done," says DJ Leon Rolle. "The impact he has when he's on stage is just immense. He's a very talented guy and it'd be a bit of dream to work with him."
"We'd love to work with him and we definitely will," confirms Amir.
For now though it's back to finishing the album, for which they have such lofty ambitions.
"When we all met we talked about what we wanted to do in five years time, 10 years time - what we thought is, 'We want to play Glastonbury's main stage, we want to have classic albums like the big acts like Massive Attack,'" concludes Amir.
"We want to bring out a seminal, genre-defining album."
Rudimental's single Not Giving In is out now
- Published29 October 2012
- Published25 October 2012