Tim Hughes is impressed by a down-to-earth Rudimental as they hit chart heights

Rudimental are unstoppable. Already riding high on a wave of excitement for their brand of melodic vocal drum ‘n’ bass, a couple of weeks ago saw them grabbing the top spot in the charts.

The success of single Waiting All Night is just the latest high point for a band who marry sing-along choruses with live instrumentation and rolling basslines to devastating effect.

And it couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch of guys.

“Rudimental are a band that paieces soul and electronic music,” says Piers Agget, who met bandmates Leon ‘Locksmith’ Rolle and Kesi Dryden in his home borough of Hackney, East London. The fourth member, Amir Amor, is from Camden.

“We are part of a music culture in London that set out to fuse styles and genres to create something completely new.”

Piers, a pianist, is talking to me on his mobile as he prepares to board a flight at Heathrow, ahead of their gig in Oxford on Tuesday. The band are on their way to play a show in Austria, but he’s not going to let the small matter of checking in, or queueing for security checks, get in the way of chatting about the band’s tour. The queues are long and we’re both going to make the most of it.

“I’m spilling coffee all over my hand,” he laughs, when I ask what he is doing. He breaks off to confirm to a check-in clerk that, yes, he has packed his own bags, and then he’s back in the zone.

“It’s all been a bit unreal,” he says. “But I’m getting more used to it now and doing things like Soccer AM are less of a shock.”

The latest brass and Hammond-flavoured Number One, with its sultry Ella Eyre vocal, follows in the footsteps of previous chart-topper Feel the Love, Not Giving In and their collaboration with New York rapper Angel Haze, Hell Could Freeze. It is accompanied by their debut album which had its release just a day before their O2 Academy Oxford gig.

This comes hot on the heels of shows in Australia (along with Stone Roses and Prodigy), the US, and a support slot for Plan B — with whom they share a belief in spreading positive messages through music.

“We definitely get on, and on tour we hung out and went partying with him — and got into lots of conversations about the music industry and politics,” he says.

“There’s a social message in his music and ours. We sing about being from London, growing up here, and finding possibilities and choosing the right paths. We want to show reality. Even in our videos we have real people and show positivity.”

Refreshingly, Rudimental define themselves not as a band but as a collective, following the likes of Soul II Soul, Massive Attack and Basement Jaxx by not appointing a frontman.

“They are all like my brothers,” says Piers. “It’s been a long rollercoaster but we all get along. And playing to 30,000 people at a festival is amazing. “Playing live is a massive part of what we do. We want to get our music to the fans and have a good time.”

The band, (who take their name from a piano book used by Kesi as a child) have also collaborated with a great wish list of singers including Foxes and Emeli Sandé as well as talented souls they met through happy accident — such as MNEK, whom they bumped into coming from a neighbouring studio while they were recording the deep house epic Spoons, newcomer Sinead Harnett, and John Newman, whom they met in a pub.

“I’ve been doing a few things,” Piers says. “I used to play in my dad’s band, doing blues, soul and rock & roll covers in pubs and for weddings, and I played in John’s band as well. I was also into producing and writing and ran a studio in Tottenham. It’s been hard graft.

“Rudimental have been together for quite a while now, though. We hung out and did teenage stuff and grew up in that London rave culture and pirate radio scene. We come from a bass and electronic background and listening to Cool FM, which is a big jungle station, from around the corner.”

“But we all come from a musical background as well as production, and I’d always wanted to mix live instruments and electronic music.”

“We’ve been surviving by music,” he says while fumbling for his passport for yet another check.

The band are proud of their Hackney roots. “The support from Hackney is amazing,” says Piers. “It’s a vibrant corner. We’ve got Labrinth, Professor Green and lots of talented people. “And, in general, when people know you come from the same place as them they will support you. It’s only people who are jealous who don’t.”

So with success comes fame – and recognition. And girls. “It’s not too bad!” he laughs. “In London it’s okay and no one really cares, but elsewhere it’s a bit different, and we have to keep our heads down. It’s great we’ve managed to take this amazing direction though. And make some amazing videos.

“If there’s a message, it’s that there is creativity in youth and youth culture and it’s important to not give up. You’ve got to find out what you are good at. We haven’t come from rich backgrounds or the best of opportunities but we have made something of ourselves.

“There are lots of times when we could have gone down the wrong paths – but this is about positivity in hard times. We’ve spent years and years doing this – but hard work pays off.”

He is just hitting his stride but, as he goes through security, and with a stiff walk to the departure gate ahead, we agree it’s probably best to leave it there and catch up later, perhaps even in Oxford. Maybe we won’t, but the offer was genuine, and tells us everything we need to know about this captivating, yet solidly level-headed bunch of Londoners.