8/10

Oliver Pinder has always written like someone standing at the edge of a confession, but on 'too late to tell you', he finally lets those unsent sentences tumble out. The result is a blisteringly intimate, beautifully constructed sophomore EP that captures the hush of the things we never managed to say, delivered with the quiet force of someone who’s done running from their own truth.

Where his debut EP 'Potential, I Guess?' signalled promise, this new collection feels like the moment that promise fully arrives. Across six tracks, Pinder slips between hushed indie balladry and widescreen emotional outpouring, sketching out all the conversations that never made it into daylight. Love never spoken aloud. Grief that arrived before the right words did. Friendships that could have used more honesty. It’s an EP built from small moments with big shadows, delivering the kind of writing that stings because it’s familiar.

The singles already hinted at the shift: the sweeping ache of 'love of my life', the bruised warmth of 'lonely together', and the ghost-laced shimmer of 'haunted'. Each track showcases his uncanny ability to take the language of overthinking, and turn it into something cinematic, tender, and painfully true.

There’s also a striking duality in the production. One side shaped with James Kenosha’s crystalline touch, the other moulded by Mickey Dale’s atmospheric grit, crafting two worlds that meet seamlessly in the middle of Pinder’s songwriting. The result feels like flipping a vinyl and discovering a different shade of the same heart.

Yet the emotional heft of this release goes deeper than the songs themselves. Pinder’s upcoming run of shows through independent venues and record shops is a love letter to grassroots spaces, community, and the belief that music belongs in places built by real people. His decision to honour his late godmother by supporting her charity adds a resonance that turns grief into generosity, and memory into action.

'too late to tell you' is a reminder that the smallest words often carry the greatest weight. Oliver Pinder has captured that fragile, universal ache with startling clarity. It’s his best work yet, and it cements him as one of the UK’s most emotionally fluent young songwriters, someone who knows that sometimes the quietest truths hit the hardest.