Dashboard Confessional: Chris Carrabba (vocals, guitar, keyboards); John Lefler (guitar, keyboards); Scott Schoenbeck (bass guitar); Mike Marsh (drums, percussion).
Additional personnel include: Adam Duritz (vocals).
Recording information: Avatar Studios, New York, New York.
On his fourth studio album, Christopher Carraba expands his personal vision and sound into a collection of emo anthems and slow-burning ballads that feel denser and larger than any of Dashboard Confessional's previous work. The title track is the only acoustic number on DUSK AND SUMMER; the rest of the acoustic guitars are folded into a richer, more epic sound courtesy of producers Don Gilmore and Daniel Lanois. There is an elegiac feel to this disc; it is an album full of songs about endings, fading light, and last chances. But Dashboard Confessional is typically unwilling to go gently into that good night.
The disc begins with an ode to vulnerability, "Don't Wait," with the rhythm section driving steadily ahead while plaintive vocals tell a cautionary tale of days passing by. "The Secret's In the Telling" is a more defiant strain of melancholy, with Carraba resigned but still romantic among the power chords and pounding drums. Even last chances, he suggests, are chances worth taking. Or, as he sings on the slow rocker "Currents," "If it's gonna end/then let it end in flames."
What the critics say...
Rolling Stone (p.68) - "Carrabba proves again that he's emo's best singer, channeling his malleable croon with grace and seize-the-moment power..."
Spin (p.83) - 4 stars out of 5 -- "DUSK OF SUMMER represents a major upgrade in Dashboard's sound: 'Don't Wait' surges with arena-rock guitars..."
Entertainment Weekly (p.160) - "Several songs invoke summer's end....The band is powerful enough to match Carraba's grandiosity and lust." -- Grade: B
Alternative Press (p.199) - 4 out of 5 -- "From the gently played meditations of 'Stolen' to the muscular rock of 'Reason To Believe,' DUSK AND SUMMER is proof that Carraba's ability to drop hugely emotive choruses into three-minute pop songs has become its own form of classic American songwriting."
