Dashboard Confessional

My suggestion would be to drop your blinders and realize that emo can be a hugely wonderful style of music.

Get these albums for the very best in the realm of emo (emotional hardcore):

Thursday - Full Collapse
Sunny Day Real Estate - Diary
At the Drive-In - In/Casino/Out or Relationship of Command
Joshua Fit For Battle - To Bring Our Own End
Rites of Spring (creators of emo, later merged with Minor Threat to form Fugazi)
 
i like Thursday... that's pretty much the only band i like from the emo genre.
 
Dashboard Confessional isn't THAT bad. Hell..put that shit on while studying and it's great background noise (probably 'cause you don't wanna pay attention to it and it's mellow enough...heh).Then again, I do have a love/hate relationship with his stuff and might be seeing him next week (mainly 'cause MxPx is opening).
 
Dashboard Confessional isn't good background music because it is so goddamned whiney! It makes most emo seem relatively stoic in comparison to the dreadful waves of whine after whine. The singer's first band, Further Seems Forever, is pretty whiney as well. Their newest album without him isn't THAT bad but it sure isn't that good either. Give me something with kick like Beloved over that crap any day.