Vibes: it’s the word that Rudimental uses to describe their many collaborations on their debut album, ‘Home.’ All four members, whom hail from Hackney, also known as the “Ghettos of London,” have catapulted to the top of the U.K., U.S. and Australian charts with their hits “Feel the Love Feat. John Newman” and “Never Give In Feat. John Newman.” They have broken down the music scene with their sound, combining house, jungle, garage, drum and bass and even reggae together to create their unique sound.
The U.K. electronic quartet, including Leon Rolle, Piers Aggett, Kesi Dryden and Amir Amorhave, have successfully brought soul into electronic music. They have created their own genre, taking music back to its roots – the instruments. Each artist plays an instrument- which may be part of the groups appeal. Either way, they are the next big thing to hit the music scene mainly because of their ability to play any track off their album live and sucessfully.
I recently sat down with Kesi, one-fourth of Rudimental, and got to know a little bit more about the London lads and the making of their debut album ‘Home.’
How do you choose who you want to work with; Each artist has a different sound and feel, yet how do you guys get them to fit perfectly with the Rudimental vibe?
Its all about how we make the music and the right vocals for the right song. We try to get the song together and think of the perfect vocalist for each song. We have lots of different vocalists on the album to fit the different vibe of each song. We’ve got a good network of people we have been working with and when we make the music we kinda hear a voice in our head and we invite them down and to record the song.
For “Feel The Love” with John Newman, we had written it and I was actually the one signing on the track to start with just to lay down the idea. Then we had met John in our local bar with his guitar we just heard his voice and it just blew us away, we just said he would be perfect for feel the love…we wrote another song with him “Not Giving In.”
I want to talk a bit about your music videos, as they are just as powerful and meaningful as the music you make. Your videos are not just artificial scenes about vanity, but real life struggles. Is that a part of your message?
Yeah definitely, when we make the music and we like to show a real message in our videos and create a piece of film that is gonna trigger emotions for people when they watch it. We wanted it to be something a bit different than just a club scene or just partying. Our video for “Feel The Love” was actually filmed in Philadelphia about a charity which open the horse stables that was set up to keep the young people out of the gangs in the local area and get them into something positive…it was major to see that.
We’ve all come from a place in London that’s frowned upon and our message is kinda saying that you can come out on top no matter where you are from. That sense of triumph can be seen in our videos.
We are all about being positive and showing different things that happen in the world. We don’t have actors just people who have been through real situations who are living these lives which that we are documenting in our videos which is a really cool thing to see…real people who are living real lives.
After listening to your album and listening to all the different styles, where do you get your inspiration from? For instance, your track “Spoons” with MNEK & Syron is so unique and different from your other tracks.
Where we grew up in London (Hackney) there were with so many different cultures and so many different styles of music going around. Our parents are quite into soul music and introduced us to that type of music.
At the same time we had the whole dance raving culture in the U.K., which is where the house, jungle, garage and drum and bass came from. We have sort of combined all these styles of music and we have come up with our album ‘Home’….all sounds from where we have grown up; that’s partly the reason why we call the album ‘Home’ cause that’s what it sounded like for us.
I know you, Piers and Leon have all grown up together since you were young, but most people don’t know you have been together for about six years before the addition of Amir and the success of the chart topper “Feel The Love.”How have you guys stayed so motivated and evolved with your music to where you are now?
We have been making very similar music on our album from when we were young. People really didn’t understand where to put our music when it came to labels and clubs; they did not know where to put us because we have so many influences. We didn’t just stick to drum and bass or stick to house. People didn’t really know what to do with us.
We just kept on going and staying true to what we believed in….we sort of had the break in the U.K. with “Feel the Love.” The proper people in London would never say we were drum and bass, it’s a drum and bass influence, but I mean we’ve got a trumpet solo in the middle of it so it’s not the normal drum and bass you would hear. So that gave us a license to be creative with our music and go on the journey we wanted to be creative.
I’ve heard a lot about your stage performance, even including a live horn player, so what else can we expect to see on stage this coming February on your tour?
There’s nine of us on stage, the four Rudimental guys and our other friends who we’ve grown up with. It creates a good vibe when we are on stage together.
In February we are going to develop our live shows some more. Full graphics which will be nice step up. The live show is really cool; we all play instruments and we can play fully live…..if you like the album now, you will probably like it even more once you’ve seen it live. You will get the message a lot clearer.
I know you guys have a huge love for soulful music like Marvin Gaye, Earth, Wind and Fire and Lauryn Hill. Could we ever expect to see you remix some of their music with the Rudimental drum and bass style?
We actually do it in our live show. We do a remix of the song “Ready or Not” by The Fugees…we give it a drum and bass twist….we like to change our set quite a bit.
Do you have any collaborations in the works that you can share with me? Is there anyone that you would really like to jump on a record with?
There is so many people we would love to work with but someone that we would really love to work with is Lauryn Hill. Her album ‘The Miseducations of Lauryn Hill’ is one of our favorite albums.
Only a couple of years ago, we needed a platform and we where struggling to get that platform so we could get out there and let people hear our music… so its great to be in a positions where we can discover new talent and work with upcoming artists and our album is a great example of the so many incredible voices on our album that was unplanned before.
We also try to work with artists who are just starting out. We would love to come to America and find some new talent.
What would you say would be one of your dream festivals to play at? And why?
Coachella would be really cool…it sounds like a cool festival.
How have you stayed so grounded after your success? I’ve heard you guys would love to give back to your community one day and build a studio in Hackney, where kids can go and make their own music.
Music is our passion and we are very grounded; we haven’t changed the way we are living. Everything is still the same, even catching the bus to the studio.
We don’t want us to change and change the way we make music. You don’t get everyday experiences if you don’t catch the bus to your studio…..I think that’s what happens to all these rappers; they are rapping about how big their houses are and how massive their cars are because they don’t have these normal experiences to rap about anymore ….we wanna keep our music real and keep it grounded.
Preview ‘Home’ below and purchase the entire album via iTunes.
This Interview was written and completed by Yolande Pretorius.
Share On
