Dashboard Confessional

Unplugged (2002)

Hein Terweduwe

MTV sucks and Dashboard Confessional is for wussies! Yeah right. But with this CD/DVD of an uplugged show that was recently recorded for MTV, Chris Carrabba and his bandmates astonish me again and leave me wondering what the hell has happened to my music taste once more. I, the one person in the world that would never tolerate acoustic stuff in any of my toplists, am totally going along these emotional loaded tearjerkers.

Don't start telling me I just get taken along with some hype or anything. Damn, I was forced to listen to similar stuff of this kind too many times lately. But none of them get near to the passion this guy is able to put in his songs. I have been doubting so many times about it myself since I listened to their full-length "The Places You Have Come to Fear The Most". To such an extend that I was trying to get some recognition with other bands in the scene (check the answers of many bands in the punkviews-section of my own site punkupdates.com). But in the end I think I'll have to stick with what I've always been telling everybody: music is about involvement and passion. And no matter what kind of music it is, if those things shine through in YOUR head and ears I guess it's OK. I just never expected this to happen for ME with acoustic music.

The album contains 7 of the 10 songs on the before mentioned full-length released on Vagrant, all 4 songs of the "So Impossible" EP released on Vagrant as well, 3 of the 4 songs on the most recent "Summer's Kiss" EP released through Eulogy and to start things off there's the title track from their first LP "Swiss Army Romance". Earlier reviews of this band only justify my thoughts on this one; the songs from the full-length are outstanding. Out of the other songs there's only "Hands Down" which reach comparable standard. I guess that's where my driving mood is rearing its head again, because those songs definitely are more driving ones than the rest of the album.

The one thing that is slightly annoying me with this release is the fact that the audience is responsible for quite an amount of the singing duties. It just provokes terrible visions of Beatles-mania to me, the screeching little girls included. Damn, the guy who did the mixing of the surround sound was even credited on the disc. On the other hand I guess I'm singing along myself when I hear this.

Anyway, the guitars, bass, drums, piano and of course the vocals that these 4 guys have captured from this show prove that the passion they put in their studio work before is also dripping from their live performance. Even better maybe, the singing is a bit more reality alike which adds to the credibility of the dedication and heart they put in their work.

What a wussy I am huh…maybe I should label Fearless's upcoming release "Punk Goes Acoustic" my most anticipated release for 2003 now.