recording for "calculating infinity" took place in march, april and june 1999 at trax east recording studio in south river, new jersey, with production led by steve evetts alongside the band's lead guitarist ben weinman and drummer chris pennie. the recording process has been described by weinman as "extremely difficult" due to technological limitations, and resulted in an album with which he initially felt "very unhappy". in an interview with "decibel" magazine, the guitarist added: "in the studio it was really hard, because at the time we didn't use pro tools and did everything to tape". the group also ran out of money during the process, resorting to trading their individual publishing rights for the songs to their label relapse records in return for $2,000 to complete the recording. speaking about the decision, weinman commented: "we weren't thinking about the future, just the present and how this record had to rule"; vocalist dimitri minakakis agreed: "we weren't focused on what the record could possibly do; we just wanted a record we were happy with", adding that it was a decision agreed by every member of the band.