Graduates nominated for a MOBO award

Former students, Piers Aggett and Kesi Dryden who make up half of the production outfit Rudimental, stormed to the top of the UK charts earlier this year with their number one single 'Feel the Love', featuring John Newman.

The pair, who both graduated from Leeds Metropolitan University in 2008 from the BSc (Hons) Creative Music and Sound Technology course have been shortlisted in the MOBO category of Best Newcomer and are up against the likes of pop star Rita Ora and former X-Factor contestant Misha B. Last year's MOBO awards saw superstar Jessie J crowned winner in the same category.

The 17th annual MOBO Awards will take place at Liverpool's Echo Arena on Saturday 3 November. Voting is now open via the official MOBO website.

Piers commented: "After graduating, I started doing stage and sound work at Hackney Empire and Kesi started working in a school as a learning mentor, also teaching music production. Since we left Leeds Met, we have always been making songs and going to recording studios to record ideas in our free time off work. We networked a lot over the years and built up some good contacts through collaborating with artists and remixing jobs. Also we were involved with an independent label called "black butter" which really gave us a platform for our music and helped us a lot. We are currently working on the second single and album with the label Asylum/Atlantic and we are also doing lots of gigs over the summer. It is amazing that we've got this far, and we can't wait to release the album."