3 Doors Down: The Top 10

3 Doors Down’s ’00 debut single, “Kryptonite,” which lead singer Brad Arnold wrote while in high school, peaked at #3 on the Billboard Hot 100. The parent album, “The Better Life” went 7x platinum. An impressive launch for the Escatawpa, Mississippi, Post-Grunge/Alternative Rock band that formed four years earlier.

#10. Duck And Run

The third single from 3 Doors Down’s debut album, “The Better Life,” “Duck And Run” had a three-week run at #1 on the Billboard Mainstream Rock chart. But following the 9/11 terrorist attacks in ’01 the track was placed on an “inappropriate for airplay” list by the Clear Channel broadcasting group.

#9. Be Like That

“This song was strange, because I wrote the verses and the choruses at two completely different times,” remembered frontman Brad Arnold. “And I couldn’t think of the verse for the chorus, or the chorus for the verse. I always sing in my vehicle on my way home from band practice, and one night I was sitting there singing, and I put those two together, and I was like, ‘Duh’.”

#8. Away From The Sun

“For about a two-to-three-year period in my life… I didn’t even feel like climbing up the hill anymore, because every time I climbed up somebody was gonna push me back down it,” Arnold explained. “That song is a reflection of that time period in my life. And thank God it’s over. But I just felt away from the sun.”

#7. When We Were Young

“Being young is hard. Everything’s in front of you for the first time,” offered Arnold. “Those things that are in front of you seem so much bigger than they do when you’re looking back on them. Looking back on my teenage years and before, a lot of it doesn’t seem as hard as it did then because now it’s behind me and I hardly remember it.”

#6. Loser

The song spent 21 weeks at #1 on the Billboard Mainstream Rock survey.  

Arnold has stated that if “Loser” hadn’t become a hit, neither would have the succeeding two singles (“Duck And Run” and “Be Like That””).

#5. Let Me Go

The break-up song was originally written for the “Spider Man 2” soundtrack but didn’t end up getting used.  Arnold explained that “we liked it so much, we kept it for ourselves… because it also had meaning to me personally.” 

#4. Here Without You

“I kind of meant it as a happy song, because it’s talking about being here without you, but she’s still with me in my dreams,” Arnold recalled. “And tonight, it’s only you and me, so the song was really about that dream. And being in a state of peace, because you’ve got that person there with you in your sleep. In that way I kind of meant for it to be a little bit of a happy song.”

#3. It’s Not My Time

In May of ’25 Arnold revealed in a video message that he was battling clear cell renal cell carcinoma, or ccRCC, a type of kidney cancer. “it’s stage four, and that’s not real good. But you know what? We serve a mighty God, and He can overcome anything.”

He closed the message saying, “I think it is time for me to maybe go listen to ‘It’s Not My Time’ a little bit.”

“It’s Not My Time” was originally written for the remake of the film “The Poseidon Adventure.” Arnold remembered that “it was gonna be a track on that movie. In the movie, they’re just trying to escape their death. And there’s a ship sinking. They showed me like a 30-second clip of the movie, and I went and wrote that song from it. And they wound up not wanting it, so I was like, Cool, we’ll keep it.

#2. When I’m Gone

“It’s asking a question, just please love me when I’m gone. And not just like when I’m dead and gone, but when I’m gonna come back,” Arnold said of the song. “But at the same time it’s kind of about unconditional love. So I guess that song is just about needing someone really to be there for you unconditionally, and when you’re gone.”

#1. Kryptonite

“That song seems like it’s really just kind of like asking a question. Its question is kind of a strange one,” Arnold proffered. “It’s not just asking, ‘If I fall down, will you be there for me?’, because it’s easy to be there for someone when they’re down. But it’s not always easy to be there for somebody when they’re doing good. And that’s the question it’s asking. ‘If I go crazy, will you still call me Superman?'”