IT must be a bit of a blow when your second album gets rave reviews, you book a UK tour and then the brother you founded the band with decides to put his medical career first.

But while drummer Doug Fink is dedicating his life to being a doctor, Noah and the Whale's Charlie Fink is sticking very much to music.

Well, music and film, as it happens.

Charlie says: "Doug is a doctor and that's what he wants to do. We have brought in an extra guitar/keyboardist and a new drummer. But despite that, the live set seems as close to being fully realised as it ever has been to me.

"The change has come at the right point. It's a transition stage for us."

Noah and the Whale will be playing The Rockhouse in Derby on October 8 and performing tracks from second album The First Days of Spring.

It has received glowing reviews and comes ready-made with its own film, directed by Charlie.

"When I listened to the album the first time, I thought it had a very powerful impact," says Charlie, "more so than anything I have done this far. You never know how people are going to react but it gave me a lot of self-satisfaction.

"Before the album had any songs, or any narrative, we had the concept of having a film as the structure of it."

In these days, when music observers are declaring the album to be dead as a concept as digital buyers dip in and out to find their favourite tracks it seems odd to deliver a CD with a story that's best heard (and seen) as a whole.

"An album as a piece seems to have lost its value," admits Charlie. "People pick at it. But we are trying to create a submersive feeling with the record, where you are put in a place where you react to and take in the album as a whole. It's not unique, there's lots of people making great records at the moment but we are swimming against the tide. This is just trying to highlight what an album can be. The whole can be greater than the sum of its parts.

"As for the film, the only experience I had was doing our previous music videos."

However, that hasn't stopped Charlie making a film that runs the length of the album and which was shown at London's ICA cinema earlier this month.

The band themselves are named after Noah Baumback's quirky movie The Squid and the Whale and Charlie is heavily influenced by cinema.

"My favourite contemporary film-maker is Paul Thomas Anderson (There Will Be Blood) but I also like Werner Herzog and David Lynch," he says. "A whole wide range of things.

"I'd like to direct films straight up as its own thing, make a more conventional short or feature."

But the music comes first and Charlie knows that the band's rising profile will make life a little harder from now on.

He says: "I felt more pressure writing this record than I did with the last one. I felt we were progressing even before it was released. I know now that I have raised the bar for myself. Anyone in the arts at some point gets confronted with their capabilities. You need to look that in the eye; test yourself and see how far you can go."

NOAH AND THE WHALE

WHERE: The Rockhouse, Derby.

WHEN: Thursday, October 8.

TICKETS: £12 in advance.

CALL: 01332 209236 or visit www.therockhousederby.co.uk.