Hey dudes. Remember when untucking your school shirt, dousing yourself in LYNX deodorant and wearing a wallet chain was the way to be cool?

It was the early '00s, and you were probably listening to some unholy mix of Evanescence, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Sum 41, Hoobastank, and hell, even Nickelback. You know, dude ballads.

Often saccharine and always dramatic, you could count on these dude ballads to have some post-grunge hard guitar, because you were a man, godammit. Some even included questionable rapping, a la nu-metal heavyweights, Linkin Park and Limp Bizkit.

The unfortunate thing is, you really love these songs. You really do. We're here to give you permission to listen and love again. These tracks deserve a place on your secret Spotify playlist.

1. 3 Doors Down, "Here Without You"

Breaking up with your girlfriend of two months is really hard when you're 14. This dude ballad was there to comfort you on the long, stinky bus ride home. And anyway, there's really hard guitars in there so no one thinks you're a wuss.

2. Pete Murray, "So Beautiful"

The guitar tabs on "So Beautiful" are so easy anyone could learn them in weeks to impress the girls at school. Kinda creepy? Yes.

3. Evanescence, "Bring Me To Life"

The best part of this relic of a song by Evanescence is the sporadic shouting, performed by guest singer Paul McCoy, who was part of Christian post-grunge band 12 Stones.

"WAKE ME UP"

"I CAN'T WAKE UP"

"SAVE ME"

"I'VE BEEN LIVING A LIE, THERE'S NOTHING INSIDE"

And repeat.

4. Hoobastank, "The Reason"



At the time, it seemed like a bit of a trend to have a string orchestra behind a post-grunge band, even if it didn't help the music one bit. Anyway, remember Hoobastank? Thought you didn't.

5. Red Hot Chili Peppers, "Scar Tissue"

No hate towards the Red Hot Chili Peppers, because they didn't suck. Everyone knew their songs, making them an easy bus trip singalong. Also, how sick was it if you actually knew the guitar part to this?

6. Spiderbait, "Black Betty"

Spiderbait's one and only hit, "Black Betty" was a banger of a cover. It was also Australian enough that it was the soundtrack to many a barbecue and car trip to Summernats.

7. Thirsty Merc, "In The Summertime"

If you were the owner of a Rip Curl backpack and wore board shorts constantly, you were probably the kind of dude who was listening to Thirsty Merc. Surf's up.

8. Linkin Park, "In The End"



Linkin Park's "In The End" is the ultimate in dude ballads, combining the whiney lyrics, rapping and hard guitars that were a feature of the nu-metal genre. Maybe the song was right: In the end it doesn't even matter, hey?

It's hard to be a dude. We hope this helped.

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