The Silence in Black and White is the debut studio album by the American rock band Hawthorne Heights, and their first release after changing their name from A Day in the Life.
Writing for the album commenced shortly after the band changed their name from A Day In the Life to Hawthorne Heights.
The lyrics to "Blue Burns Orange" were re-written in the studio; Woodruff remarked that during the making of the album, none of the band members were sleeping or eating properly "so my dreams were really crazy.
He had written the lyrics while doing two jobs and attending college concurrently, and "felt like [the band] was going nowhere but a lot of things convinced me to stay with it".
[5] The Boston Phoenix writer Mikael Wood thought the song was akin to hair metal with its "dueling guitar mini-solos, nonsense about getting shot through the heart, and plenty of cowbell".
It dealt with the music scene in Dayton, Ohio, and people that started hating the band as soon as they signed to Victory Records.
[18] Hawthorne Heights embarked on their first headlining US tour in January 2005 with Number One Fan and labelmates Spitalfield and the Black Maria.
A two-disc CD and DVD special edition was released on June 14, 2005, containing demo and acoustic versions of the tracks, live performances, and a documentary with footage of the band.
[22] The Silence in Black and White received negative reviews from critics, several who thought the band's sound was formulaic.
Wood thought that "even if Silence offers fewer surprises than an entire season of Joey, Hawthorne Heights use their well-worn tools to build the occasional hard-hitting rock machine".
[8] Punknews.org staff member Brian Shultz wrote that the band "suffers in how much they water down the tempo", and praying that they "do SOMETHING to differentiate themselves" from their peers as they provide "nothing new musically or otherwise".
Before the release of their second album If Only You Were Lonely in February 2006, The Silence in Black and White had sold over 720,000 copies.