Fittingly, this theme permeates the newly released Seventeen Days—an album recorded in little more than a fortnight, essentially so the band could get back on the road that has so blessed and cursed them.

From the blazing opener "Right Where I Belong"—which, with its pleading chorus, "I know why we are together / And I swear I'm right where I belong," is an ironic intro to an album about always leaving—to the Bob Seger duet "Landing in London," an ode to road fatigue that picks up where his classic "Turn the Page" left off, Seventeen Days makes the band's insular trials universal.

But this depth isn't merely lyrical; the musical components are stronger than ever on all fronts, as producer Johnny K finally gets the energy of the band's live performances on record. Sonically, the guitars and bass are up front and punchy, and drummer Daniel Adair attacks his kit with urgent ferocity.

Writing and recording in such an abbreviated amount of time prevented 3 Doors Down from over-thinking its songwriting, resulting in a far more accurate snapshot of the band's personalities than shown on The Better Life or Away From the Sun. The newly southern-flavored riffs are as thick as the band's native Pascagoula River mud, and Matt Roberts's Triple XXX®-and-6505™ attack is amped and adrenalized. This is the sound of 3 Doors Down hitting its stride.

The always-gracious Todd Harrell, an avid Peavey endorser whose fully cranked Peavey Pro Series™ bass rig carries the 3DD show, gave us a few minutes as the band took Seventeen Days on the road.

Peavey: There's a fair amount of growth in terms of lyrical content and songwriting on Seventeen Days. What have you learned about playing in this band after touring for the past five years?

Todd: I think that as much as we've been out playing, and just being around each other for so long, it just flows now. It's taken us a while to get here, but writing songs is getting easier for us. I think that's just from doing it so much. We're learning what we're comfortable with and what we like. We had our first success kind of fast and now we're getting comfortable doing it, and we're happy with where everyone is as musicians. Everybody in the band just keeps getting better, and we try to write songs about normal life so people can relate to them.

I can definitely hear your personalities more on this record than in the past—even a southern rock influence.

We've been so worried in the past about pleasing everybody else, but now we're just writing songs that we like. We definitely have that southern influence. For years, people didn't want to be labeled as a "southern" band, but that's what we are and we're not going to hide it.

During that time 3 Doors Down was adopted as the band to carry that torch, anyway.

Well, that's where we're from and we're proud of it. We've had a lot of support from people in our hometown; they've embraced us and become our backbone.

How much of the music did you write on Seventeen Days?

We do the writing together. Brad does all the lyrics, and then we get in a room together and throw ideas at each other. Me and Matt, Chris and Brad wrote the record together. When one of us comes to the table with an idea, we all kinda pick at it and work at it, and the original idea could be something completely different when we're through.

You started in music playing guitar. Do you ever go back to that instrument when writing music?

I do a little bit of writing on guitar—just coming up with rough ideas—but I love the bass so much, man, and I just stick with it a lot these days.

Are there any songs that began with one of your bass riffs?

Yeah, the first song on the record, "Right Where I Belong." I came into practice with that one day and started jamming on it, and the guys came in right behind me. That's a good bass-driven song. We opened with that one the other night in South Carolina, and it went over really well. Actually, Illbreak opened for Saliva and us. Illbreak was a little nervous, but they got out there and did really well. After every song, the crowd was roaring.

Fall As Well is with you for a few dates, too, right?

Yeah. They've got a good tour going on right now, and we're just pecking away with those guys. It's a good record. I might hop up and play "Dead & Growing Older" with them tonight. When we were doing this 3 Doors Down record in Nashville, I drove over to their show in Knoxville and got up and played with them. We had a good time.

(Editor's Note: As winner of the Peavey-sponsored Imprint Records "Search for the Next Rock Stars" competition, Illbreak is the latest signing to the label, which Todd founded in 2004. Fall As Well, the label's first band, is currently on tour supporting its debut Imprint release. For more information on these artists, please visit www.imprintrecords.net.)

When did you start using the Peavey Pro Bass rig?

I used my Peaveys on the whole 2004 summer tour. I've got the rig slammin' man, and everything's good. I've got my cabinets next to the pyro, and you ought to see 'em. (laughs) They're burnt pretty good and they still slam!

When you got into the studio, did you tweak the Pro 500™ head much, or just roll with it?

We played with it a little. This record has the best bass sound on it of anything I've done before. You can hear it, man. We miked it up in a room by itself and cranked it! We just miked it and turned it wide open.

Seventeen Days has a tone of immediacy to me, and I guess that might come from the way it came together.

The time issue was almost a good thing, though, because we didn't over-think things. Just being put in there to knock it out really worked for us. It's rawer. Edgier.

There's also much more riffing than on your second album, Away From the Sun. How much a factor was Johnny K in that?

He was a big factor. He brought so much to the table—got us playing vintage guitars and listenin' to digs by Led Zeppelin, and really focusing on parts of songs where the licks really mean a lot to the songs. Stuff where if the licks weren't there, you'd think, "Whoa, something's missing here." And his knowledge of the studio is unreal. He helped us make a great record.

Did he make everyone sit down and get the riffs right?

Oh yeah. I remember sittin' there doing some bass parts and thinking, "Man! I've done nailed it three times!" He's always looking for that little something, and after you hear it, it works. At the end of the session, Johnny and all the engineers were all puttin' in 23, 24 hours a day. They would work all around the clock, workin' on fumes, because our schedule was so tight.