While usually lumped in with the sensitive souls of emotional hardcore, Dashboard Confessional – the stage name of Conneticut-born singer-songwriter Chris Carrabba – has traditionally cut a much more intimate, acoustic-tinged furrow. Dusk And Summer, however, sees Carrabba spirit up a much denser, rockier instrumentation that should see long-term fans harking back to his '90s outfit, Further Seems Forever. Is Chris risking it all, leaving his own introspective headspace and traipsing back to the crowded landscape of US rock? Not necessarily – 'Rooftops And Invitations' makes a decent fist of melding a balladry of passion and restraint with some pluming, U2-style dynamics, while 'Don't Wait' proves that the acoustic guitar still lies at the centre of the Dashboard design. Fans should also cock an ear to 'So Long So Long', a hushed piano duet with Adam Duritz of Counting Crows with a lyric that plays to their collective talent for misty-eyed nostalgia: "How the girls can turn to ghosts before your eyes/ And the very dreams that led to them are keeping them from dying". Newcomers might want to start elsewhere - Dusk And Summer is far from representative of their style – but if each Dashboard album is a page in Carrabba's own personal journal, it's clear there's still many pages to be written. --Louis Pattison
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