HIM began demoing songs for its third album in the northern fall of 2000 at Petrax Studios in
Hollola, with producer T. T. Oksala. Satisfied with the initial recordings, the band hoped to use them on the album, with additional overdubs being done at a later date. However,
BMG, HIM's record label, disagreed, with Valo believing they wanted a more well-known producer working on the album instead of Oksala. BMG's Asko Kallonen refuted these claims, stating that he and the label were worried by the band's plan to release "essentially demos" so soon after an exhausting touring cycle for
Razorblade Romance. Under pressure from BMG's international branches to repeat the success of
Razorblade Romance, HIM was paired with producer
Kevin Shirley, who had previously worked with
Bon Jovi,
Aerosmith, and
The Black Crowes, among others. While Shirley was excited to be working with the band, they were not entirely on board with his style of producing, in addition to the amount of money BMG had spent hiring him. However, Valo later admitted that some of Shirley's ideas did improve the songs. , the band's line-up would remain unchanged until 2015 The recording process for HIM's third album lasted approximately eleven months. This had a profound effect on the songs, with Valo later noting: "When we started recording the third album, we were into
stoner rock and
Black Sabbath [...] At the end we were into
Neil Young and it shows on the record." In addition, several outside forces within the music industry contributed to the album's troubled production. According to Valo: "The industry wasn't expecting [
Razorblade Romance] to be such a hit that it was, so it meant that now there was like seventeen thousand different A&R people from the record companies and whatnots in the studio, and everybody had an opinion." During the album's recording process, keyboardist
Janne "Burton" Puurtinen replaced Jussi-Mikko "Juska" Salminen, who played his final show with HIM on 31 December 2000. After recording finished, the album was sent to
Randy Staub and
Chris Lord-Alge to mix. Additional mixing was done by
John Fryer, who had produced the band's previous album. The record was then mastered by
George Marino at
Sterling Sound in
New York. The title
Deep Shadows and Brilliant Highlights is a photography term, which Valo chose because of its
yin and yang symbolism, that had been prominent in the band's previous album titles as well. The original proposed album cover was rejected by BMG's UK branch. Thus, Valo was flown out to
London for a photoshoot with
Rankin. The resulting album cover for
Deep Shadows and Brilliant Highlights took inspiration from
Lou Reed,
Patti Smith, and late 1970s New York City art circles. ==Music and lyrics==