Six tracks were released as singles: "On My Own", "Villain", "Trip", "321", "Gunnin'", and "Street Fight". The music videos for all of these songs, except "Villain" and "Street Fight", reached #1 on the MuchMusic countdown.
Following Hedley signing a US record deal with Capitol Records in the summer of 2006, the album was released in the US on September 26, 2006. In Canada, a "Platinum edition" of the album was released on November 21, 2006, with four bonus tracks and the updated album cover.
Seven of the songs are featured on the 2009 US version of their next album Famous Last Words, released under the title Never Too Late.
"321" is the fourth single released on March 14, 2006. The song peaked at number 21 on the Canada CHR/Top 30.[10]
"Gunnin'" was released on September 19, 2006 as the fifth single.[11] The song won two MuchMusic Video Awards in 2007 for "Best Pop Video of the Year" and "Best Post-Production of the Year".[12]
"Street Fight" was released on December 2006 as the sixth and final single from the album.
Hedley was met with mixed reviews by music critics. Corey Apar of AllMusic rated the album two stars out of five and described it as "competent though largely uninteresting." In particular, he criticized the lyrics and the lack of engagement ("Even the... standout tracks... aren't that memorable," writes Apar, "taking a couple spins to really grab listeners at all.")[13] Emilio LV of Melodic called tracks such as "Villain" and "Sink or Swim" as the standout songs. However he criticized the tracks "On My Own", "Street Fight" and "321" as "Simple Plan's way of punk-pop written for easy radio success."[14] Christine Estima of Chart Attack gave a mixed review on the album stating, "Hoggard's lyrics requires some maturity, but you gotta give them props for their singable hooks and endearing party riffs a la Jimmy Eat World."[16]
Despite the album receiving negative reviews, it was nominated at the 2006 Juno Awards for "Rock Album of the Year".[17] In 2007, it was nominated for "Album of the Year" at the Juno Awards.[18]
The album went platinum in Canada in December 2005 selling over 100,000 units.[3] In 2008, the album was certified 2× platinum.
^"Hedley Hedley". Starpulse. All Media Group. Archived from the original on April 26, 2008. Retrieved 18 September 2016.
^Christine Estima (October 4, 2005). "Hedley — Hedley". Chart Attack. Archived from the original on May 30, 2010. Retrieved August 6, 2023.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link)