Yes Yes Okay Okay

Graves is in fact the pen name for songwriter Greg Olin. With "Yes Yes Okay Okay," he guides a cadre of sympathetic musicians (members of Norfolk and Western, Desert City Soundtrack, and Little Wings) on a second outing to a distinctly natural, sweetly exhilarating place. Whereas 2003's "Love Love Love" found songs ricocheting off each other within the confines of an album -- overflowing as they were with texture, mood, lackadaisical melody, and the occasional outburst -- "Yes Yes Okay Okay" dispenses with the restless energy, opting almost entirely for a palate of nylon string guitar, loping bass, crisp drumming, piano, trumpet, hand claps, and finger snaps. Herein Olin finds a perfect foundation for his tender, earnest, melodic vocals and just-shy-of-stream-of-consiousness lyrics. It's not surprising that he's been compared to Stephen Malkmus in dishevelment and melodic predisposition, but a more accurate touchstone might be Cass McCombs, if only for the sensitivity in his songwriting. Here he delivers a laid-back, melodic, never-gets-old album sure to get some heavy rotation in these dog days.