Chris Carrabba didn’t mean to start a band. He just wanted to clear his head with a solo acoustic tour back in October of 2000, a brief detour after parting ways with Further Seems Forever. But as he quickly found out, the audience already knew all the words — really knew all the words — and within a few shows, that little detour had turned into a permanent emo residency. “I wasn’t home again until Christmas of the next year,” he remembers, sounding almost like he still can’t believe it.
Now he’s marking 20 years of Dashboard Confessional with a greatest hits compilation cheekily titled The Best Ones of the Best Ones — a crowdsourced collection he put together with help from the fans. “I know what people want to hear live,” Carrabba says, “but that’s not the same as what they hold close when they’re alone in their rooms.”
He was surprised to find songs like “Fever Dreams” ranking high on fan ballots, especially since he can’t remember a single person ever requesting it live. “That one I kind of released into a vacuum,” he says. “Pre-Spotify. If you wanted it, you had to actually go buy it. On iTunes. Like a pilgrim.”
Carrabba’s lyrics have always been intensely personal — the kind that make fans scream them back with tears in their eyes and tattoos on their skin. And yes, he’s aware of just how specific and raw those early songs were. “There are a couple lines where it’s like, dude, you were just having a bad day,” he laughs. “But you don’t get to run from it. You’re stuck with your teenage angst forever.”
Dashboard was emo before emo was even a word people took seriously. And when they did start taking it seriously, Carrabba bristled — just a little. “I think I rebelled against the machine that was building around me,” he says. “But the whole thing was designed to be malleable. That’s why I didn’t use my own name. I could expand it into a band. I could shift the sound. I could do whatever I needed to do to keep going.”
And keep going he did, eventually adding more muscle, more instruments, and more sonic exploration. There was never a grand strategy. “Some people are really good at planning all that out,” he admits. “I just did what felt right.”
In the ultimate plot twist, Carrabba found himself cited as a major influence by an unlikely new generation: SoundCloud rappers. “I heard it and I got it,” he says. “Not because I heard Dashboard in their songs — but because I grew up loving hip-hop. It shaped the way I deliver lyrics. There’s a rapid-fire cadence there that I owe to those early records I loved. So when I heard them, I thought, yeah, that tracks.”
Now he’s hitting the road to celebrate the milestone, playing full-album shows featuring The Places You Have Come to Fear the Most and A Mark, A Mission, A Brand, A Scar. But don’t expect a rigid script. “I hate having a setlist,” he says, grinning. “I’d rather play the records on shuffle and just call out the next one, or let the crowd decide.” He compares rediscovering old songs like “Rapid Hope Loss” to uncovering lost journal entries — “they feel like new songs again.”
As for what’s next, Carrabba’s not slowing down. “I’m doing all the things,” he says vaguely, which is about as concrete a plan as you’ll get from someone who thrives on instinct and impulse.
In the meantime, he’s basking in the glow of a musical full-circle moment. “You hang around long enough,” he says, “and cool things happen.” Cool things like new albums from Archers of Loaf, The Cure, Dinosaur Jr., and Pearl Jam — all of whom he’s still fangirling over like it’s 1997. “They helped shape who I am as a person,” he says, “and now they’re showing me how to be a better grown-up.”
Dashboard Confessional: proof that being in your feelings can be a full-time career.
Listen to the interview above and then check out the videos below.
