were interested in working with us. [...] We were playing hardball back and forth with the label and that's why that record ... it was a difficult period for us. We were all pretty pissed off and angry and that shows in the music. Our budget got slashed for that record just because of the fact that we had not re-signed. I think it came down to "Well, re-sign now or this is your budget because that's what is says in your contract." You can't argue with that. We didn't re-sign. We didn't buckle under and I think it paid off in the end because we got what we wanted [for our next contract]. We got everything that we wanted in our new record deal ... everything that we've worked ten fucking years for and deserve, we got. We learned how to play the game and we played it very well. Production controversy Enemies of Reality is infamous for its production by Kelly Gray, which was criticized as being inferior to the quality of previous albums. Speaking in 2003, contemporaneous with the initial release, Jeff Loomis spoke with qualified favour of the recording: [Kelly Gray is] more of a pop producer kind of guy. He's worked with Candlebox before and sold millions of albums with them, so working with us, we were kind of like his lab rats, you know? He's never really done a metal band before but overall I think he did a pretty fantastic job. He got a real live quality out of us because we were always used to doing drums first and then the bass, and then the guitar and then the vocals at the very end. This time we recorded most of the songs live with the whole band and then after one song was done, Warrel would immediately sing on it [instead] of saving all of [the singing] to the very end, which kind of saves his voice in the overall recording process. I guess the whole album was done in a very different atmosphere and aspect that sounds really good. By 2005, however, Loomis had soured on the recording. Moreover, he directly attributed the shortfall in the album's sonics to budgetary constraints related to the contract negotiations then ongoing with Century Media: We were at the end of our recording contract with Century Media, and basically they didn't know if we were