It's the start of summer, which means the start of summer concerts, and more specifically, the start of the Summer Concert Series at Tropicana Field. And, we know what that means: a buy-one-get-one free of baseball and music. That's right. On select Saturdays throughout the next few months, baseball fans can enjoy a postgame concert after a Rays game for free! Can you smell the hotdogs already?

The first concert takes place during the three-game home series against the Twins, and Southern Rock band 3 Doors Down will top off the night. Metromix had an opportunity to talk to lead singer, Brad Arnold, who is no stranger to a Tampa stage.

Where are your favorite hangouts in Tampa? And can your fans expect to see you out after the game?

 

You know what? I’ve not really had the chance to fit in a lot of nightlife down in Tampa, actually, as much as we’ve played there. It’s kind of weird, you know? Everybody always thinks you go out partying every night and stuff, but really you just kinda hang backstage and chill by the buses to get ready for the next day. But, hopefully there will be nights when we aren’t on tour and I’m sure we will be out in Tampa looking for a good time.

 

Do you have any favorite Rays players?

 

I don’t get to follow it as much as I’d like to, but I do like baseball and growing up in the south and watching baseball with my dad we always watched the Braves. I never really followed it passionately, but always just enjoyed watching them. I love baseball and I like all the teams. I don’t really have what you would call “favorites,” but, I like chances to go out and have some fun at the game.

 

How do you feel about your songs becoming such big hits in stadiums and sports environments? What’s the weirdest place you’ve heard any of your music played?

 

It’s kinda surreal when you hear it. Its things you grow up listening to going to games and things. To hear your songs playing over loudspeaker is always kind of strange, but, we played up in Yankee stadium during the last all-star game and they were playing some music earlier in the interim to watch the game and I was like, ‘You know? That’s one of those things when you’re a young musician you don’t really think about. That one day you’ll just casually hear your song played over the P.A. in Yankee stadium.’ And, it creates those really surreal moments which are really cool. I like that.

 

As you may or may not know, the Rays didn’t lose a single game during their postgame concerts. Are you feeling any pressure to continue that success?

 

Nah. I think we’re going to have a postgame victory party is what we are going to have.

 

What’s the latest with the Better Life Foundation? And how are the folks in Mississippi doing?

 

The people in Mississippi are doing really good. They’re getting back on their feet after the hurricane. It’s going on 6 years this year, I guess. But, there’s still a lot of need there and still a lot to be done. The Better Life Foundation just in this past year raised $250,000 to go to different things on the coast. What we actually started doing this year is we’re in the process of purchasing 6 children’s Dream Racers. It’s a bed made out of used older Nascar parts—some new and some off of actual cars. And they make these beds out of these parts so they look like a little mini Nascar. Inside it they have a game consol so kids can sit in there and play these games while they’re receiving chemotherapy. And so, it’s something to take their mind off of their treatment and it’s a really cool thing. And something that’s different about that is we’re branching out. We’ve always focused our foundation on the coast, and those beds are going throughout the Southeast region. And, that’s the kind of things we like to do. The foundation started out to be all about children’s charities and after Katrina we broadened that scope a little bit, but thankfully now, we’re getting back to narrowing the beam and to see stuff like that happen is really exciting.

 

Can you give us an insight into your concert? Will you be playing any songs from your latest album? Maybe the one that made you guys famous? “Kryptonite?”

 

Oh yeah, we always play “Kryptonite.” Actually, we do something a little bit different on “Kryptonite;” we save it for the end of the show. Because for a little while there we got burned out on it, and stuck it at the front of the show to get it out of the way--but we let it hang back towards the end of the show now and I get a chance to play the drums on that song. I played the drums on that album and really hadn’t played much since then, but it gives me a chance to get back up there and reflect on when I used to be the drummer. When we were a local band, I was the drummer and the singer.

 

And then, we switch it out in the middle of the song. Greg finishes it out and I go back up and sing. It’s a lot of fun and we’ll definitely play some new songs as well. I’ve got a lot of songs that I really like to play on this new record. After ten years and four records and as many songs as we’ve put out (and the fans have made successful for us), it’s kind of hard to stick the songs you really want to play in there sometimes, because there are so many songs you have to play because they were hits or well-known songs. And then, it takes up the whole hour and a half, but, I guess that’s a good problem to have. And I’m really thankful to have it.