Rooney is the primary musical project of singer-songwriter Robert Schwartzman, evolving from its origin as an American rock band formed by high school friends in Los Angeles.

The band is named after Ed Rooney, the principal in Ferris Bueller's Day Off portrayed by actor Jeffrey Jones.

They have toured the nation with acts such as Weezer, The Strokes, Jane's Addiction, Travis, Keane, Audioslave, OK Go, Queens of the Stone Age, and Electric Light Orchestra.

Ned Brower replaced Briggs as drummer and Louie Stephens was added as keyboardist.

[2] The band played multiple shows a month around Los Angeles and Anaheim and built up a strong following.

Schwartzman sent his latest material to his bandmates in LA and flew home every month to perform.

The demo made its way around LA and created buzz for the band at the major labels and management companies.

Once the band and producers decided on the material and Taylor and Louie graduated from high school, they started recording at NRG Studios in North Hollywood, California.

At the end of the year, still no album out, they sold out a show at the Palace Theater (now the Avalon) in Hollywood.

The acts included The Namedroppers, Audioslave, Queens of the Stone Age, Jurassic 5, Incubus, The Donnas, Jane's Addiction, and Rooney (on the main stage).

Album sales were slow until in 2004, when they had a cameo appearance in an episode of The O.C., "The Third Wheel", where they sang the songs "Sorry Sorry", "I'm Shakin'", "Popstars", and "I'm a Terrible Person".

Rooney worked on the theme for the show Iron Man: Armored Adventures on the Nicktoons network.

The band started a winter tour with Tally Hall and Crash Kings on November 27, 2009, in Los Angeles.

The album features the lead single "I Can't Get Enough" and the final appearance of bassist Matthew Winter, who announced his departure from the band in February 2010.

With new bassist Brandon Schwartzel, Rooney toured again nationally in Summer 2010 with bands The Young Veins and Black Gold supporting.

In February 2016 Robert Schwartzman announced in a newsletter that the band is in the process of recording new material and will feature an entirely new line-up.

I think everyone in the band for so long has been pursuing so many other things, that I think naturally it was time to make a change and shift to bring in new people.

Schwartzman performed most of the instruments on the album,[5] along with several session musicians including guitarist Taylor Johnson and drummer Joel Plotnik, both of whom have been among the rotating cast of players in the current live line-up of Rooney.