With their summer co-headlining tour coming up, 311 and The Offspring have decided to cover each other’s hit songs. You can listen to 311’s take on “Self Esteem” and The Offspring’s take on “Down” below:
311’s Nick Hexum commented:
“‘Self Esteem’ is my favorite Offspring song. It’s a great melody, and the lyrics really tell a story. I like when a singer is vulnerable and doesn’t try to act all cool. We’ve all been in relationships we know we shouldn’t be in, so most people can relate. Our first version was more reggae, but we realized that it needed to rock-like the original. We revved it up to be rocking riffs with reggae rhythms. I guess we ‘311-ized’ it. It was a lot of fun. SA kicked ass on this one. The vocal requires a lot of range and he really belted it out. We had to work hard to live up to Offspring’s killer cover of ‘Down’! I love the way they reimagined it. It kicks ass! I’m glad they really took liberties instead of being faithful to the original roadmap. I love the punk parts and hearing Dexter do SA’s raps. Nice job dudes!”
The Offspring’s Noodles commented as well:
“We’ve always been big fans of the song ‘Down’. Parts of the song sound really heavy and almost dark, but it also has a very uplifting message. We knew we’d never be able to groove it the way 311 do so we tried to punk it up a little. We tried to do a Ramones-like version to serve as a companion piece to the Clash-iness of theirs. I don’t know if we did it justice but it sure was fun to play and sing.”
He also added the following about 311’s cover:
“Wow! Way cool. The guitars sound great and that bass is certainly in your face. I think what ultimately makes this version great is the way Nick and SA split the vocals and play off of each other. SA taking the high parts while Nick slides in effortlessly beneath him is a perfect example of how harmonies are supposed to work. Nailed it!”
A limited edition 7-inch (limited to 1,000) featuring the tracks can be pre-ordered on both the bands’ websites.
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