At the end of their set at Dirtfest on August 19, 2006, Every Time I Die announced that bassist Chris Byrnes would be leaving the band.

[4] On February 14, 2007, vocalist Keith Buckley mentioned that the band have been holed up in a basement in North Tonawanda, New York composing "what will easily prove to be the best record ETID has crafted since Gutter Phenomenon.

"[6] In early March 2007, the band went to California to record The Big Dirty with producer Steve Evetts for a period of two months.

The title is a reference to the 2006 film Trailer Park Boys: The Movie,[7] in which the criminal protagonists plot to pull off "The Big Dirty," a grand heist, before retiring from their lives of crime.

The band said the album was "Chock-a-block with riffs that only 4 months of a Buffalo, New York winter could spawn, this new record will undoubtedly satisfy [long-time fans.]

The Big Dirty is the CD you would compile if asked to make a mix of the BEST Every Time I Die songs you haven't heard yet.

It’s about coming to terms with the fact I didn’t need to stop living.”[9] According to a press release, the lyrics to "Imitation Is the Sincerest Form of Battery" were based on the Federico Fellini film 8½ (1963).

The press release also mentioned that the track "has everything that the band has become notorious for wrapped into one two-minute-and-thirty-second keg stand of ass-kicking fuck-all.

[16] On August 28, a music video was posted for "We'rewolf" on the band's Myspace profile; it is inspired by the film Teen Wolf (1985).