Stephen Erlewine of
AllMusic stated "The success of his song for
Enchanted painted Jon McLaughlin as a Midwestern
James Blunt, a simpering soul who wants nothing more than to bare his soul. To be sure, McLaughlin does a lot of that on his second album — and first since
Enchanted —
OK Now (it almost seems as if he forgot the 'What' in the title), often scrubbing those tunes so they can slip undetected into anonymous AAA airwaves. Where McLaughlin has strength is when he loosens up and gets into big, bright pop, the kind that ruled the airwaves in the mid-'80s, after new wave synthesized productions and before adult contemporary flattened them. This is certainly due in part to the presence of
John Fields, the same producer who's given the
Jonas Brothers a lively sheen not too dissimilar to what's heard on
OK Now.
OK Now is unapologetic mainstream pop that's not heard too much at the tail-end of the 2000s: hooky, oversized colorful tunes that drill into the subconscious almost immediately. All this makes McLaughlin's taste for the mawkish — which surfaces not just on those ballads, but on his plea to featherweight freshmen to just hold on through the 'Four Years' of high school — a bit of a buzzkill, bringing the album down to earth when it should soar. Of course, this is often a problem with mainstream pop albums, but at least the rest of
OK Now illustrates that Jon McLaughlin has a greater gift for a big, bright hook than most of his pop singer/songwriter peers." A low tempo ballad, the song literally defines Jon's entire musical substance and his record label would be smart to release it at some point, as there is no doubt it would be a fan favorite. Taking a risk doesn't always work out.
OK Now is an exception to that. The new combination of Jon McLaughlin's original folk/piano rock sound with a new more pop spin heard here comes off as a clear winner and will unquestionably captivate fans until the next time around." ==Track listing==