3 Doors Down [ tickets ] bassist Todd Harrell says his head has been spinning since his band scored the 2000 hit "Kryptonite" from its debut album, "The Better Life."

"Success kind of happened really fast for us," he said. "Now [things are] a little more at ease. I know what to expect from different situations. We just did a lot of learning that first year."

Some of the Escatawpa, MS-based band's success has come from surprising places. After its sophomore album, "Away From the Sun," spawned the power ballads "Here Without You" and "When I'm Gone" the group learned it had many fans among military families and troops.

"It's turned out that the military's kind of adopted that 'When I'm Gone' song," Harrell said. "We got the chance to go overseas and play for some of the guys right before all the wars and stuff broke out"

He continued: "It was a real good experience for us. ['When I'm Gone'] is just a song that a lot of them guys can really relate to. … Them guys in the service, they give up a lot to keep us free over here."

Harrell talked to liveDaily during his band's recently concluded tour about "Away From the Sun," a new album that is in the works and the band's mindset.

Are you surprised by the tremendous success of "Here Without You"?

The success of the single just kind of blew up. We always hoped and hoped for that. It has kind of been something to watch. It's just kind of unreal to watch it all unfold, you know?

When you were writing the song, did you see it as a hit?

I knew it was a good song. Definitely it was going to be a strong one, didn't know it would do quite as good as it's done.

Tell me about the songwriting process in 3 Doors Down. Do you write primarily at home, on the road?

It depends. Throughout the tours, we'll be throwing ideas at each other. And when we come off the road, we all gang up in a house somewhere and start putting it together. We do it all together. Brad [Arnold, singer] does all the lyrics and the rest of the guys, we just all get together and do the music. We write the music and Brad writes the lyrics.

How long did it take you to write "Away From the Sun"?

I think it took us three months to write the last one.

How does that compare to other albums?

That was fairly short. I think we're going to try to do this next one even quicker. We want to put out one even before this year's up. [W]e're going to take a month off, then we're going to get right back into the writing process, then head into the studio sometime in the summer. Hopefully, we'll get it out by September somewhere.

Have you started writing new material yet?

Yeah. We've been writing for a little while now. We ain't all sat down and put nothing together. We just kind of been bouncing around ideas.

What is the tone of the new material?

I think it's going to be along the same lines. It's probably going to be a little more heavier, a little more rockin'. [On "Away From the Sun," we were] kind of shell-shocked from that first record, you know? We were thrown to the wolves, as you might say. It took us a little while for our heads to quit spinning after the first tour. I think that's kind of what we wrote about--being away, and being gone and away from family and friends. I think that's kind of what we touched on [with] the last record. This time, we're in a little bit different place. I think we're going to get back to the rockin'.

How would you describe the place you're in?

We're more comfortable. I think we're just a little more at ease. We kind of know how things work now in this business. You know what I mean? Got a little better understanding of things and we're just gonna get back to what we know.