365 project "but as for me i wish that i was anywhere with anyone making out"

147.

artist:dashboard confessional
album:the places you have come to fear the most

i was OBSESSED with this album when it first came out. i was also obsessed with a boy that i worked with at the radio station. this story ties those two together.

one of the perks of working at the radio station was getting to borrow stuff out of the on-air studio. this was before burning Cd's was common practice, so it gave me good reason to go visit on Tuesday nights when this kid was doing his show. we had a lot in common-we grew up a few towns apart and we both had kick-ass tastes in music. he was adorable and i wasn't invisible to him, so as far as i was concerned, this was a match made in radio station Heaven...never mind his rampant drug-use or laundry list of other bad habits.

so anyway, one Tuesday night, as i did most Tuesday nights, i went up to the station to return the disk i had most recently borrowed, the one i had been borrowing frequently and was itching to actually buy for myself, which was, as you can probably guess, places you have come to fear the most by dashboard confessional. i waited for the "on-air" light to flick off and then went into to booth to return the disk to its rightful place on the wall, and the guy i spent most of my first year of Monmouth drooling over turned around and said "i KNEW you had that disk. i went to play a song from it earlier and noticed it wasn't here. it took me about three seconds to figure out who had it." we chatted a bit about who even knows what, i picked a song from that disk for him to play, we chatted a bit more and then i went on my way.

eventually i moved on from this obsession...from both of them actually. i ran into that kid about a year or two ago at a show at the northstar, and he was still a drunken mess. it took him a minute to figure out who i was, but once he figured it out, we talked for a while. i learned that he didn't change at all over the last ten years. id like to think that i have.

365 project "in the damp air, this car hears my confessions. i think tonight ill take the long way home."

136.

artist:dashboard confessional
album:summer's kiss EP

i was in love with the first two full length dashboard albums, as well as the so impossible EP, so i figured another EP, especially of songs i already knew i liked, was a sure-fire hit.

i was wrong.

you see, what i loved about dashboard at that time was the acoustic sound. i am and have always been a sucker for anything acoustic, so this new brand of emo that was rolling out was absolutely right up my alley. lyrically, i really dug his stuff, and a boy and his guitar make my heart swoon every single time.

but when that boy takes his guitar songs and goes back into the studio and returns with full-band versions, it doesn't always make me a very happy camper. in this case, it definitely didn't. i listened once or twice, decided i hated this crap, and stuck it on a shelf. some part of me in the back of my head must have known that there was a part of me that would like it eventually, though, because it survived several shelf-purges.

i listened to it again today, and  you know something? its not so bad. i mean, its not my new favorite by any means, but its better than i remember it being. i had a good time singing along and bobbing my head to the drum beats. i guess its a good thing i kept it around.

and i have to say something totally unrelated to that story. i just right now listened to the dashboard confessional daytrotter session, and Chris covered archers of loaf's "web in front" and his voice sounded froggy and the cover really, really sucked. wow, that was terrible. that's depressing.

365 project "she always wears blue..."

135.

artist:dashboard confessional
album:So Impossible EP

This EP brings back lots of fond memories, but the one that i always think of first is the one that makes me laugh the hardest.

I bought this EP right around the same time that i decided putting a metal bar through my tongue was a good idea. I was so busy doing college-y things during that week that I didn't bother taking it out of its plastic, but on the drive home that Friday afternoon in Denise's car I finally had the chance to take a look at the disk that i was so excited to own. I distinctly remember reading the lyrics to "hands down" and thinking about how great these songs were going to be.

now, because it had been a busy, rushed day, i had to wait to eat until i got into the car, but because i had fresh damage to my tongue, i was only allowed to eat baby food, and of course when i was done eating i had to rinse with Listerine to keep from getting an infection. none of this seemed to be a problem when i was planning it out, but the best laid plans...

i ate the baby food with no problem. (if you were wondering, it was strained peas...i really like strained peas.) then it came time to rinse, which i didn't really think through until i had a mouthful of Listerine burning a hole through the side of my mouth. i had no where to spit. Denise figured out what was going on and rolled the window down for me, which should have been a decent solution, except that we were on the Garden State Parkway and going easily 80mph. i really didn't have a better option, though, so i went for it.

it all splashed back in. on us, on the dashboard, all over the interior. the whole car smelled like Listerine.

it was pretty rock and roll.

365 project:"its hard to believe that i am getting by on so little from you"

day 20.

artist:dashboard confessional
album:swiss army romance

i figured that since im in this rather awful funk i might as well give into it fully and listen to some dashboard tonight. theres really nothing better for an already depressed girl.

its kind of weird that as much as i love this album, i dont really have an emotional attachment to it. i have story after story about the places you have come to fear the most but theres not a whole lot clanging around inside of this head of mine when it comes to swiss army.

there isnt a song that i still go to for mixtapes. there isnt one that still gives me chills when i hear it. thats not to say that i dont like the album, because i absolutely do, rather, though, that i was actually surprised that i owned it, to be honest. i was going through my cds the other day trying to pick something and i found this one and had to ask myself where i even got that cd from...a question that i still havent answered.

starting sometime during my senior year, i decided that it was too mainstream to like dashboard confessional anymore, so i stopped listening. just cut them out. id bash chris carabba whenever the oppertunity was given. id say things like "i liked him better before he had the band" or whatever pretentious line was appropriate at the time. yet while all of this was going on, i was still listening to the moon is down by further seems forever with stunning regularity. what can i say? my pretentiousness was not terribly sensible.

i connect a lot more to this album at thirty than i ever thought i could have at twenty. not that at either age i was ever spending my life on the road and with a significant other who was also on the road at seperate times, but i feel like the stories chris tells on this album are more adult real life situations and less "taylor swift" (note: i am not knocking taylor by any means. i adore her and am a fan. she just sings more teen romance stuff and not adult gotta-pay-the-bills stuff).

i know that when i get around to places ill have a lot more to say. as far as this album goes, though, im having more trouble concentrating on getting through this entry than i ever did getting through any homework assignment ever. if i dont end this now, its going to turn into a discertation on why more kids need to go through the scared straight program.