Remember when you and your buddies would stay up all night drinking Mountain Dew, eating pizza and playing ‘Tony Hawk’? The soundtrack of choice for such an age adolescent nerd revelry was obviously the tones of 311, for whom the basement trend continues in new single ‘Time Bomb.’

The Omaha, Neb. quintet, together since 1988 and 10 albums deep, have their sound down to a science (read: formula). Crunchy guitars, crisp, jilting rhythms, and back-and-forth rock-rap (remember that?) lyrics are exchanged between the awesomely named Nick Hexum and less awesomely named Doug Martinez. The dreadlocked bassist goes by P-Nut. We’re guessing he’s of the baked, if not blanched, variety.

‘Time Bomb’ comes off of ‘Universal Pulse,’ their hypnotically cover-arted release from last year. For what it’s worth, you may mistake Hexum’s lyrics as mockery of a lame attempt at freestyling — see “I’m rocking on the mic / Saying things that you like,  a line so staggeringly asinine as to be unforgettable. Martinez joins in for the equally profound chorus, beginning “Let me introduce you / To the excitable crew.”

We are not enthused.

The instrumentation is cool in a Cool Ranch kind of way. It’s the kind of thing that you play while hitting up Taco Bell for that Fourth Meal, or anything titled Xtreme: a tired attempt at being what once was cool.

Listen to 311′s ‘Time Bomb’

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