show, Rock offered to work on their debut. Recording sessions were held at Planation Mixing and Recording in Maui with Rock producing. Recording was handled by Brian Joseph Dobbs, with second engineer Eric Helmkamp. Mike Gillies did some digital editing. Arentzen said Rock was "one of the reasons it's so huge-sounding. There was never enough stuff on there. [He'd say] 'OK, let's double that, let's put more, more, more, In a 2003 interview, Jones said if they played a piece of music that "sounded kind of angular, [Rock] would steer us away from it". Rock mixed all of the recordings, except for "I'm a Fool", which was done by Randy Staub. Composition Musically, the sound of American Hi-Fi has been described as pop punk, and power pop, drawing comparisons to Blink-182, Foo Fighters, and Weezer. All of the songs on the album were written by Jones, influenced by the disbandment of Veruca Salt. Stacy's work as a drummer in Veruca Salt was displayed in the rhythm-focused songs on American Hi-Fi. The opening track "Surround" is an alternative rock song, which was reminiscent of In Color (1977)-era Cheap Trick. "Flavor of the Weak" is about a girl that was mistreated by her partner; it features a guitar solo that recalled the work of Cheap Trick. "A Bigger Mood", as well as "Scar", is driven by Nolan's drum parts and Arentzen's guitarwork, channeling the sound of Sugar. "I'm a Fool" includes Fountains of Wayne-esque vocal harmonies, and is followed by the Nirvana-indebted "Hi-Fi Killer". "Blue Day" includes a homage to the Rolling Stones' track "Sympathy for the Devil" (1968). Release On November 26, 2000, American Hi-Fi was announced for release early next year. The following month, American Hi-Fi toured the US east coast with SR-71. "Flavor of the Weak" was released to radio on January 9, 2001. On February 12, the band performed on The Late Late Show with Craig Kilborn. American Hi-Fi was released through Island Records on February 27 of that year. The UK version included the demo "Black Satellite", and the music video for "Flavor of the Weak". For the following two months, American Hi-Fi supported Eve 6 on their headlining US tour. Following this, the band went on a six-week US tour with Our Lady Peace, and played some shows in Canada. While in Canada, they appeared and performed on MuchMusic and Open Mike with Mike Bullard. In