Several days before Matchbox Twenty’s Rockford show Tuesday, the band’s drummer, Paul Doucette, took time out to chat with PLAY about the band’s new bonus CD, touring and songwriting.

PLAY: So Matchbox released a bonus CD, Ep, with live and unreleased songs and tour footage Tuesday. What made you put together a project like that at this point in the band’s career?

Paul Doucette: It’s just some stuff we had laying around. Some of it has been released before overseas. We just put it all in one place.

PLAY: Matchbox is nominated for two American Music Awards, including “Fan’s Choice” and you’re being taped for VH1’s “Big in 2003.” Do you have fun at big red carpet events or are they just tedious?

PD: I don’t go to big red carpet events often. I don’t necessarily think they are all that fun and the shows tend to be long. I’ve never really thought that all that was all that great, but when you get nominated for an award, it’s a nice compliment.

PLAY: You also have a “Hard Rock Live” episode airing soon. How was that experience different from other TV stuff you’ve done?

PD: We were good… [laughing] We never felt that we were very good on television, whether it was because we got nervous or because of technical problems. The American Music Awards last year were horrendous. We had the worst technical problems in the world. We saw the broadcast of it and we were shocked. It was so bad that it was embarrassing, and that was the first time we played live off of that album. A few weeks later we played in Singapore at the MTV Asia Music Awards and we rocked — for first time ever, we were really good on television. It was a real turning point for the band. Ever since then, we’ve been okay, knock on wood.

PLAY: How do you choose songs for TV performances? Is it always necessarily the latest single you have out?

PD: Usually you have to do the single you have out now. That’s why you are there; you are promoting it. But it’s different every time. Sometimes they will request that you do different songs. Like you can do whatever you want, but you have to do “Bent.” With Hard Rock, there were a few songs that they really wanted us to do but we got to fill the rest of it up with songs we felt like doing.

PLAY: I saw you and Rob [Thomas, lead vocals] on “I Love the ’70s” and you were hysterical. Did you have fun doing the show?

PD: We had done four or five different interviews for like four or five different shows for VH1 that day. They were just like “Hey, we have this show ‘I Love the ’70s’ and Rob, you did ‘I Love the ’80s,’ so would you answer some questions for that?” and we were like “Yeah, sure, why not?” It was kind of like a normal press day, but it was fun to be goofy. We answered questions on music stuff.

PLAY: You guys are so much fun to watch. I remember you and Adam [Gaynor, rhythm guitarist] throwing drum sticks at each other for like five minutes during a song. How do you keep the magic and camaraderie going night after night?

PD: Unfortunately it’s not there every night, which is what makes live shows so great because anything can happen. When you start playing the first song, you get a feeling: this is going to go well or this is not. If you’re having a great show, you obviously are having a lot more fun. And sometimes when you are having a really bad show, you’re also having a lot of fun cause what else are you going to do? Sometimes they’re so bad it’s like you’re trapped in quicksand. After we’ve played live for so long, we don’t necessarily get mad at ourselves any more when that happens. We’re just like “this is funny, ” and we can laugh at ourselves.

PLAY: You guys usually do a couple of covers every concert. Do you like having an excuse to step outside of Matchbox’s signature sound? What’s your favorite song to cover?

PD: We love doing covers, ’cause at the heart of it, we’re just music fans. There’s so many songs that we love. We get to play an entire arena, and how great is it to pretend like you’re U2 for a second? We’re still playing in front of a mirror. We’re doing an R.E.M. song called “Turn You Inside Out” from Green that I really like. It doesn’t go over as well as some of the other covers cause not as many people know it, but we love to play it. We do a version of “Heart of Gold” by Neil Young that Kyle [Cook, lead guitarist] cooked up that’s fun.

PLAY: Fountains of Wayne is opening up for you on this leg of the tour. Do you guys usually pick who goes out on the road with you?

PD: We always choose our opening band. The way it works is you get a list of people who are available or these are people who have records coming out, etc. Off of that list, you kind of go “Oh, I like this band and I like this band.” Then you say “Let’s see if these guys are available.” Fountains of Wayne was one of those bands who we were like “Oh, we’d love to play with them.” They were available and wanted to do it, so it just worked out for the best. We’ve been fans of theirs for years. We think those guys are great songwriters, just masterful, and we have a lot of respect for that.

PLAY: Sugar Ray opened up for you for the first leg of the “More Than You Think You Are” tour. How was it working with them?

PD: Oh, they were fun. We didn’t know how that tour would work at first because what they do and what we do is kind of graphically different. And then we went ahead and did it and I thought it was an amazing combination. Plus, they put on such a great show that we were like “Oh, we can’t suck now.”

PLAY: If the band was only able to have one type of success, would you rather go down as a great live band or one with a bunch of chart-toppers?

PD: I’d rather have a band that made great records. We don’t judge our success on whether or not we’ve had a hit. “The Macarena” was a hit. You can’t really judge it on that. We feel like we’re getting to the point where we are starting to feel confident making records. [Latest CD More Than You Think You Are] is the first big step in that process. We’re all, a year later, still really proud of this record. Usually after a year, we’re like “Uh, I would have changed this, I would have changed that.” We’re not really doing that that much on this record. We really like it.