Dashboard Confessional at the Nikon at Jones Beach Theater

Dashboard Confessional
Nikon at Jones Beach Theater
Wantagh, NY
June 14, 2015

Chris Carrabba is the driving force behind Dashboard Confessional. As the alternative, emo, indie rocking band's lead singer/chief songwriter, Carrabba has been called the posterboy for his musical genre and generation. Many of Carrabba's songs are filled with a large amount of angst and are about love, life and failed (but also occasionally fulfilled) romance. In his songs, he definitely wears his heart on his tattooed sleeve. His pain can genuinely be felt in his lyrics and his vocal delivery. That is what emo is all about and Carrabba can easily be considered one of the genre's ringleaders.

The band originally burst upon the scene in 2000, when Carrabba recorded The Swiss Army Romance (Drive Thru Records) as a solo side project while he was still a member of the band Further Seems Forever. In 2001, Further Seems Forever recorded and released its album, The Moon Is Down (Tooth & Nail Records). Carrabba left the band shortly after the release of the CD and recorded his second solo offering, The Places You Have Come to Fear the Most (Vagrant Records, 2001) which was also released under the Dashboard Confessional moniker.

As 2001 faded into the ether and 2002 became a reality, Dashboard Confessional developed into a full-fledged band. During that year, Carrabba was joined by three other musicians, performed on the MTV Unplugged TV show and released MTV Unplugged 2.0 (Vagrant Records, 2002). The album has been certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA).

In 2003, the band released its third album, A Mark, A Mission, A Brand, A Scar (Vagrant Records). The album reached number 2 on the Billboard charts. In 2006, Dusk and Summer was released on Vagrant and debuted at number 2 on the Billboard 200. In 2007, Carrabba and his band released the more acoustically-based album, The Shade of Poison Trees on Vagrant Records.

After 2009's Alter The Ending (DGC/Interscope/Vagrant), Dashboard Confessional went on a recording hiatus. Though the band reunited periodically and toured as recently as 2011 in honor of the band's The Swiss Army Romance debut CD, there have been no new CD releases.

Now, in the spring and summer of 2015, Dashboard Confessional has reunited, is touring and has announced plans to record a new CD. On a warm and muggy, soon to be rainy Friday evening in mid-June, Carrabba along with his cohorts in crime Scott Schoenbeck (bass), A.J. Cheek (guitar), and drummer Ben Homola returned to Carrabba's geographical roots at Long Island's Nikon at Jones Beach Theater. The frontman was born close-by in West Hartford, CT. At 16-years-old, he and his mother moved to Boca Raton, FL. Many of his family members were in attendance for his and Dashboard's return to the New York stage supporting Third Eye Blind.

The evening's festivities began when the outdoor venue's main lights dimmed, Carrabba appeared on stage (while the crowd was still filing into its seats) and innocently stated, "Hey ya'll. How you doing? I'd like to thank you both for coming." If anyone in the audience was wondering if the band still "had it," these fears were quickly set aside as Carrabba strummed the first notes of "Streaming Infidelities." The audience screamed with pleasure when, following "Again I Go Unnoticed," Carrabba announced that "we're gonna stick with some old stuff if it's okay. I like the way it's starting to fill-up out there. I guess you really take it easy on Sundays. We're called Dashboard Confessional; we've been on a little bit of a hiatus." The crowd erupted and band then tore into "The Good Fight." Clearly enjoying himself, Carrabba bantered freely with the audience. When the photographers left the photo pit following "The Good Fight," he quipped, "Don't go. We're having so much fun." Alluding to the band's long hiatus and what he had been doing during that time, he said that he "started about fourteen bands. One was called Twin Forks. Go to twinforks.com to download some free music. You all don't like free stuff do ya? You'd rather pay for it, I know. This one even comes with another bass drum section. It's called 'Back To You.'" With that, his cousin Sean came on stage with a bass drum and joined the band on the Twin Forks signature tune.

The band then ripped through the rest of its shortened set (a storm warning for the area caused Dashboard to drop about three songs and leave the stage earlier than scheduled so that Third Eye Blind could perform its own shortened set and finish before the thunder storm hit). The set included a kick-ass version of "Saints And Sailors," "Stolen" which was introduced as a song about summertime and "Vindicated" which was played with the accompaniment of many of the female members of the audience on their feet singing the lyrics (at the top of their lungs) along with a ebullient and delighted Carrabba.

The performance ended on a high note. Carrabba came center stage and simply and a matter-of-factly stated, "Thanks for inviting us back. We've missed you. We're not going anywhere...This is a song about the best day I ever had. It's called 'Hands Down.'" The song about the best date that he ever had produced the desired effect as what appeared to be the entire audience rose and sang along with a connection and a conviction that made the song the perfect ending to a great show.

For many of the devoted fans in the crowd, the rebirth of Dashboard Confessional was the best day they ever had.

Photo Credit: Christine Connallon
[Additional article contributions by Christine Connallon].

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