2007 was a hectic year for The Maccabees.

Their debut album, Colour It In, was hailed not only as one of the best debut albums of the year, but as possibly the best alt-pop album of the year, full stop. Their last date of the year, at London's Roundhouse, sold out, and the Brighton band looked ready to take over the world.

So why, at the beginning of 2008, are they embarking on a tour of tiny venues, including Manchester's Jabez Clegg on Monday, April 28, capacity, um, about 100.

"Because we haven't played any of these new songs to anyone we decided just to do a small, low-key tour just to play them in," says bassist Rupert Jarvis. "With our first record that's how we gauged if a song was good enough or if it needed to be changed, so we want to do that again to see how the songs go down.

"And we just wanted to get back on tour again, we've been sitting around for the last five months just doing nothing and we need to get back on the road."

"Doing nothing" is a bit unfair, however. With Colour It In having been such a surprising success ("It never felt like it kicked off that big," says Rupert), the band are under pressure to deliver with their sophomore effort. So are they suffering from Difficult Second Album syndrome?

"Yeah, I would say that," says Rupert. "I'd like to see someone who didn't really. I think there are very few bands that don't have that problem.

"We just spend five hours a day locked up, arguing with each other over parts of a song."

Although they have great affection for their debut - "we all still love it to bits and we're very happy with what it did," says Rupert - they say the new songs are "a bit more mature".

And they're not letting all the praise make them complacent.

"You just have to ignore it and get on as normal," says Rupert.