Tell the Rising Sun

Album Review

Those less inclined to be charitable might suggest that the Straw Dogs have fallen into a musical rut, but Tell the Rising Sun will be as comfortable as a pair of perfectly broken-in jeans to anyone who has been following the Seattle-based band over the course of its career. Loping, easygoing alt-country rock in the Son Volt tradition, the Straw Dogs would be fairly anonymous were it not for Dave von Beck's canny songwriting and obvious love not only for '80s jangle poppers like R.E.M. but their '60s-vintage Rickenbacker-toting prototypes. The 12 tracks on Tell the Rising Sun are uniformly catchy, twangy pop songs, unpretentious and casual. Von Beck and second guitarist Darren Smith, the mainstays of the band, have perfected a ragged-but-right vocal harmony style best shown off on their two co-written songs, "Amelia" and "Sour Apple Fields." Still, the fact remains that there's very little difference, in style or overall quality, between this album and the two that immediately preceded it.