Alongside The Kooks and British Sea Power, over the past five years The Maccabees have become synonymous with Brighton as part of the city’s music scene.

But that is set to change. The five-piece have now returned to their London roots, leaving only guitarist Hugo in the city where they wrote both their critically acclaimed debut album Colour It In and its soon-to-be released follow-up Wall Of Arms.

“We’ve been in Brighton for three or four years now,” says Hugo. “Everyone has started to feel like they wanted to get back to London. There wasn’t a plan to stay in Brighton, although it ended up that no one ever left, which was nice.

“Brighton was a relief from growing up in London. It was somewhere that was a bit calmer for a while. It was a nice place, especially at the ages of 19 or 20. It didn’t feel like anyone you knew had a job, everybody was just hanging out all day, and everywhere was just five minutes’ walk away. There were so many venues and so many bands, it was quite exciting for us.”

Brighton had also played an important part in the band’s development too, not only for developing their notoriety after a 2006 show at Concorde 2 got out of hand.

“The Brighton Riot Of ’06,” remembers Hugo. “It was nothing like that really. We played the Concorde 2 last year – it is all sorted now, they allowed us back!

“We played everywhere in Brighton. It’s where we found our management and got the band going.

“London is a big place. It’s hard to get heard, but in Brighton the same people would come back to the shows and we picked up a following quite quickly. This gig in Brighton is like a special one for us, it’s like a homecoming gig.”

He regards the new album as a “massive step up” from the band’s debut.

“By the time we released Colour It In we had been playing those songs for a long time,” he says. “We toured for two years, and after a year we were ready to move on and play other songs.”

The band spent “a solid year” in rehearsal rooms, working on material for the follow-up, fighting over every element of how the next album would sound.

“Writing took six months longer than we thought it would,” says Hugo. “We didn’t expect how hard it would be. Even deciding who to do the record with took a long time.”

The band eventually plumped for Marcus Dravs, who had previously worked with Bjork, Coldplay and Arcade Fire.

“It was amazing to have him on board,” says Hugo. “He is a genuine guy.”

The recording sessions saw the band move about to try to keep everyone fresh, starting out in Liverpool for three weeks, before moving to Lincolnshire’s Chapel Studios and spending a month living in Paris.

“We came back and finished it all off in Reading at this £15 million mansion,” says Hugo. “The place was huge – acres of grounds and stuff. It was an amazing experience. It was our pay-off for the hard work.”

The first chance for fans to hear any of the new material was with the free download, No Kind Words.

“It’s not really a single,” says Hugo. “It was us trying to get something out there. We hadn’t done anything for a year, so we thought we would get it out and remind people we hadn’t disappeared.”

The video for the song uses 1980s cartoon graphics to depict a concept suggested by Maccabees frontman Orlando Weeks about the two levels of a conversation. At its centre is one of the band’s best-known fans, Gavin And Stacey star, Matthew Horne.

“Matthew’s been coming to see the band for years,” says Hugo. “He had been going on about being in a video for ages, so when we found out we didn’t have a big budget, we went to him.”

Support from The Third Man and Lyrebirds.

  • Starts 7.30pm, sold out. Call 01273 673311.