Dashboard Confessional are back with Alter the Ending, the follow up to 2006's Dusk and Summer. On this album, the Boca Raton, FL group show immense musical maturity from their earlier works and continue to create earnest and heartfelt anthems that speak to a whole generation of youth growing up today.
The album starts off with "Get Me Right", a mid tempo number with indelible guitar riffs and frontman Chris Carrabba's powerful and emotional vocals building up all that energy towards the song's climax. "Until Morning" is an anthemic and melodic number that is sure to be an energy booster with its powerful drums and crunchy guitar riffs. "Everybody Learns From Disaster" is a low key, heartfelt affair with its simple guitar arrangements and lush melodies spread throughout. "Belle of the Boulevard", the album's first single, is a mid tempo, melodic tune with Chris's vocals adding musical dexterity to the track, making this song one of the standouts on this album.
Other highlights from the album include "I Know About You", a high energy melodic number that is sure to have you singing along whenever you hear it. "Even Now" is a largely acoustic affair, eloquently showcasing Chris's emotionally descriptive lyrics and heart tugging melodies. "No News is Bad News" exercises the same musical qualities, but with more varied experimentation and more of a complete band effort. Dashboard Confessional have always been known for creating deep, emotional ballads that resonate particularly strongly with teenagers and young adults, perhaps alluding to romantic occurrences happening in their everyday lives.
My favorite track off the album is "Hell on the Throat", an emotional and beautiful ballad that has wonderful instrumentation on all fronts, faint piano notes heard in the background and acoustic guitar riffs heard up front just adding to the incredible array of emotion on display here.
In retrospect, a wonderful and complete effort from Dashboard Confessional, a band who aren't afraid to wear their hearts on their sleeves, showcasing the raw and pure emotion that permeates so much of their music and has built up quite a loyal following because of it.
Album Score: 4/5
Track Listing:
- Get Me Right
- Until Morning
- Everybody Learns From Disaster
- Belle of the Boulevard
- I Know About You
- Alter the Ending
- Blame It on the Changes
- Even Now
- The Motions
- No News Is Bad News
- Water and Bridges
- Hell on the Throat
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