LESS than two years after a No I UK album and an Ivor Novello Award-winning single, Athlete were without a record deal and rapidly running out of cash.

It was the lowest ebb for the four Londoners but the band refused to quit and have now signed with a new label and are embarking on a marathon tour that includes a date at Derby's Rockhouse.

"We certainly got worried about money," says keyboard player Tim Wanstall. "There were a couple of times where we were just a month away from running out of cash to live on. But going through that experience has a positive side because it forces you to consolidate and think about what you are all about. We parted company with EMI, which was becoming a bit of a sinking ship at the time we put our last record out. We left them at the start of last year and I think it will now prove a brilliant thing for the new album.

"We have signed for Fiction Records and it's a really exciting label to be on. They have Elbow and Snow Patrol, White Lies, Kate Nash. If you were a brand new band they would be the kind of label you would want to sign on to.

"We look at Elbow. They are a band we have always liked but they hadn't achieved as much as they deserved. These days it's a really refreshing story to see a band like them hitting their fourth CD and it being their biggest.

"Even when we originally signed for Parlophone there was still a sense that some record labels stuck with artists for their careers and you could have dips and ups and downs and that was considered normal. These days we expect bands' first albums to be their biggest ones and then it's downhill from there and we give up on people too quickly. In every other artistic field we expect people to improve their craft as time goes on.

"So it's good to be with a label that believes in longevity and good music. It's not about marketability but about making great songs. We wrote nearly all the new record while out of contract and didn't have any considerations about having to deliver a product. It was a chance to go back to grass roots level and just make music for the love it. Now it seems like our second first record."

Athlete will release their new album, Black Swan, in August and are now on a mammoth 30-date tour that will reintroduce them to music fans.

"It's our biggest ever tour around the UK," says Tim. "We are excited about it because we haven't toured properly for nearly two years now. We did a few dates when we started to record the new record back last September but literally only places we could drive to from London.

"We love going back to those 500-capacity venues and really connecting with the crowd. It's a dynamic we really enjoy. It seems like we haven't been around for quite a while so the best way to start was by going on a tour and reaching as many people as possible. It's a marathon by British standards but in America it would still be considered a mini tour."

Athlete earned a Mercury Prize-nomination for their debut album Vehicles and Animals in 2003 and an Ivor Novello Award in 2006 for the song Wires from the double platinum CD Tourist.

"Wires ended up being a massive song," says Tim. "It was top of the airplay charts in the country for a whole month. So on the back of that people would have expected we would be more well known than we are. But we are at the stage where we are married, a couple of us have kids, so we aren't out doing the red carpet thing.

"But that kind of celebrity only really adds false growth and leaves you in a situation where it's harder to keep going long term. When we left EMI, 90 per cent of bands would have given up and folded. For us, we always have a quiet confidence that on a musical level we will come up with the goods."

ATHLETE

WHERE: The Rockhouse, Babington Lane, Derby.

WHEN: Wednesday, July 15 (doors open at 8pm).

TICKETS: £15.50 in advance

INFORMATION: 01332 209236 or www.therockhousederby.co.uk.