In nature, a sun dog is an atmospheric illusion; a trick of the light that makes it appear as though there's more than one sun in the sky. It's nature messing with us to alter our perceptions, which makes it a natural title for
Rose Windows debut outing.
The Sun Dogs is an album that's all about constantly shifting your perceptions, appearing to be a sprawling post-rock album one moment, then a bluesy doom record, then a pastoral folk record, and so on, making each change gradually enough that it feels like whatever sound it's settled on is the one it's been doing all along. The truth is that it's actually all of these things and more, but
Rose Windows show such a deft hand with incorporating different elements of both modern and traditional music that they themselves seem to be playing a musical shell game with the listener, moving things around so that just when you think you've figured out where you are, the musical landscape around you has shifted.
The Sun Dogs never loses the listener, though, which is a pretty stellar achievement given the sprawling expanses
Rose Windows creates here. Though the album's openness does require some amount of patience on the listener's part, it's a beautifully crafted album that expands upon the ground laid by the recent experiments of
Earth, and will provide anyone willing to explore the depths of tracks like "Walkin' with a Woman" or "The Shroud" with a rewardingly trippy listening experience. ~ Gregory Heaney