Catfish And The Bottlemen are a four-piece band from Llandudno in North Wales. They released their debut album The Balcony last year and saw it chart at No 10 in September. They won the BBC Introducing Award at the first BBC Music Awards in December 2014 and performed Kathleen. The Balcony was released in the US on January 6, the day after, they performed on the Late Show with David Letterman. The band's current tour brings them to Tyneside this month for a sell-out night at the O2 Academy. For more information go to catfishandthebottlemen.com. What's On spoke to frontman Ryan "Van" McCann about snow, football shirts, and why everything is going exactly to plan

You're in Toronto right now?

Yes, we're touring North America before we get to the UK. It's all covered in snow. Quite different to North Wales.

How has the tour been going?

Absolutely class. I'm having the best month of my life. We've been getting on amazingly, the gigs have been really sweet too. We're playing small venues again. We've just sold out two nights at Brixton Academy in London, which is 10,000 tickets, but over here we're playing 300-600-capacity venues, so it feels different.

How so?

Well like we're cheating, almost. We're playing smaller rooms in the US, but that's where we grew up as a band and learned our craft, and where I learned to be a frontman. It's so exciting. But we're back here, but having already done all that before. We're ahead of the game, but no one knows.

How has the reception been?

It's been amazing. From the off, the crowds are sold. They're won over before we turn up. It's really easy and natural. We walk on stage each night and the people are on our side. It's like walking into your living room and it's full of your best mates.

Are you pinching yourself?

No. Not at all. This is all part of the plan. We've planned this since we were boys. We're proud of what we've achieved so far, and humbled by some of the opportunities we're getting – we played on Letterman the other night – but this is what we always wanted, this is what we always dreamed of, and going on to play stadiums. At the moment, we're just warming up and we're really hungry. We're not walking around thinking, 'Can you believe this?'. We're walking around thinking, 'This is great, but it can be better'.

What's next?

We come back to the UK tour, then Australia and Japan, then we're doing some festivals. We're not sure which yet, as our agent won't tell us, he wants us to find out when the rest of the public find out. We're as excited to see who is playing at certain festivals as everyone else. We're playing Leeds and Reading festival, going on before the main headliner. That's huge for us, and it's going to be amazing.

What was your reaction when The Balcony charted at No 10?

We were really pleased and proud, because we'd done it off no money, and not much backing and media attention. We're not a hype band, we're a word-of-mouth band. So that all made me really proud, but most of all, on physical sales, we were at No 1. That was the one record that week most people had gone out and bought in a shop. That really meant a lot to me. I really wanted the album to go in at No 11, as that was the number I wore on my football shirt.

March 26, O2 Academy, Newcastle. Sold Out