Emo artist expecting good reaction in L.A.

By Michelle V. Gonzales
Daily Bruin Contributor

If the swamps of Florida could talk, they may never have
predicted a punk-rock kid from the state of old people and wild
night life would head out to Los Angeles and become a hit among emo
kids across the nation. This, however, is just what Chris Carrabba
did.

Dashboard Confessional, the project of singer/songwriter
Carrabba, started its tour earlier this month to promote the 2001
album “Places You Have Come To Fear The Most,” released
last year on Vagrant Records.

Emotional punk rock music, otherwise known as emo, has
maintained itself as a favorite on college campuses.

Dashboard’s label mates The Get Up Kids and Saves the Day
are prime examples of emo bands with cult followings. Dashboard can
hope for the same kind of response from fans, who take deeply
stomached emotions and release them via reactions to the music.

Could Chris Carrabba’s car ever have predicted that it
would give him a pseudonym that fueled a persona that would launch
his career?

Carrabba’s song, “The Sharp Hint of New Tears”
tells a story that led to the creation of the project’s
name.

“It was a time that was introspective for me. One of the
lines went “˜On the way home, this car hears my
confessions,'” said Carrabba.

What would the tour bus walls say about Dashboard
Confessional?

“It would probably say that we’re the hardest
working people in show business,” Carrabba said.
“I’m a singer/songwriter with a great band and I try to
write songs that are honest and compelling and connect to some kind
of universal truth.”

Hard work, line-up changes, and similar sounding label-mates
have helped Dashboard reach the audience that it has collected
since the album’s release.

With the video “Screaming Infidelities” receiving
play on MTV2, Dashboard is attracting an audience that may have
otherwise been unaware of their music. But to Carrabba, the more
the merrier.

“I just knew that my friends would be in the audience
singing along,” said Carrabba. “Now I’ve gotten
so many more friends.”

From a hotel room in San Diego, a very mellow, single-sentenced
Carrabba has little to elaborate on his project’s success. He
comments sparsely on topics like the environment created at a
Dashboard show and the reception he looks forward to in Los
Angeles.

“(The Los Angeles) kids are passionate, they have high
standards,” Carrabba said.

Opening for Dashboard on the tour will be good friends Ben
Kweller and The Anniversary. Bassist Dan Bonebrake and drummer Mike
Marsh, friends from previous bands, will accompany Carrabba
onstage.

Dashboard will give the Los Angeles audience plenty of time for
emotional sing-alongs with two shows at the House of Blues on
Sunset Boulevard March 11 and 12. The tour is a time for fans to
see more sides of the Dashboard.

“I know that there are some twists that we’ve never
done before,” Carrabba said.