Bleed American

Released in 2001, this is Jimmy Eat World's fourth full-length album. It is also an Enhanced CD

The enhanced CD basically takes you to a secret are on the Jimmy Eat World website where it requires that you have the CD in the slot to access it. There's been different stuff such as interviews with the band and MP3 downloads.

Track Listing:
1. Bleed American
2. A Praise Chorus
3. The Middle
4. Your House
5. Sweetness
6. Hear You Me
7. If You Don't. Don't
8. Get It Faster
9. Cautioners
10. The Authority Song
11. My Sundown

How do you accurately label how the CD sounds like? A lot of the CD has a very light rock sound to it with the exception of the title track, Bleed American. The singles for this CD are Bleed American, The Middle, and Sweetness. I believe that they also tried to get A Praise Chorus out as a single, but I think it didn't do too well on radio.

Also, this CD technically doesn't exist with this name anymore. After the 9/11 attacks, many bands were forced to change something, whether it be an album cover, a music video. Jimmy Eat World was no exception, changing the "Bleed American" CD to JEW's "Self-Titled" release. It even went as far as having to have Jim Adkins (singer/guitarist for JEW) explain what Bleed American meant.

"I normally don't like to reveal the intent of our songs," Adkins explains, "but I do feel I should go into detail regarding the title of 'Bleed American.'

"The lyrics describe a period when I was trying to deal with panic attacks. I didn't leave the house much and when I did, I'd go out drinking with friends - alcohol seemed to numb the anxiety. At that time I was also reading Howard Zinn's "A People's History Of The United States 1492 To Present." I was amazed at how far back labor struggle goes in the U.S. and how intense it's been. On some level, I guess I equated that with what I was going through personally. It inspired me.

"So one day I decided I was sick of feeling helpless. I made the simple decision that I wasn't going to let myself feel like that anymore. The title 'Bleed American' is a reference to the lyric 'I bleed the greed from my arm/ Won't they give it a rest now.' That was meant to say I'd decided to change.

"'Bleed American' is about the desire to change one's life for the better. We named the album Bleed American after that song because that theme of the desire to better oneself runs throughout the entire album.*