Too Late

It seems strange that they never played 'Too Late' live in 1982 when they were performing a lot of new, then unreleased songs that later appeared on PCL. I wonder why they discarded it totally after the John Peel Session instead of developing it into 'Finished' version.

Originally posted by Solitude It seems strange that they never played 'Too Late' live in 1982 when they were performing a lot of new, then unreleased songs that later appeared on PCL.I wonder why they discarded it totally after the John Peel Session instead of developing it into 'Finished' version.

Yeah, I'm intrigued by that, too. I love this track (not in the least the intricate way in which the drums have been mixed into it). Maybe they abandoned it because it didn't fit in with the new direction they were headed in by this point. I tend to look upon the second Peel Session as a definitive goodbye (well, for the time being) to the Joy Division sound & style. After all, the broadcast of this session coincided with the release of the Temptation/Hurt single, which is something completely different altogether.

I love the way the second Peel session captures perfectly that moment where they had decided to move way from the JD sound but hadn't yet discovered the 'dancefloor' style. It's very varied and you can tell they were trying out different sounds and experimenting like crazy. Too Late is my favourite from the session and always appears on any 'Best Of's' I make up for people. I always assumed they (probably Barney who hates all the early stuff) thought it was too Movement-like. It's structured very similarly to Doubts Even Here, which is another of my top NO tunes.

Just listening to it again (agree, top early track), but what is Barney saying in the muffled vocal line at about 2:30 to the end, or is it just gibberish?

Perhaps they decided that two long 'moody' pieces would unbalance it all (the other being 'We All Stand'). I agree with what's being said above though, something changed at this time. I too include it on lots of NO CDs for the car, you can get quite a good selection of quality tunes from Movement and the singles / sessions up to PCL, specially the stuff off the various EGG tracks.

Still strange that they didn't play it live as they playing a lot of dates around the time of the session & were introduicing new live material all the time. The session itself was recorded in early May during the month's gap in their live schedule between the gigs in Paris on the 17th April (We All Stand debuted two day earlier on the 15th) and in Norwich on the 24th May, when 586 first appeared. So it seems it was written, recorded & discarded within that one month. If you take this example along with other songs such as Homage, Skullcrusher/Solitude & Let's Go (original), it leads me to think that there must be other songs discarded in this fashion after demos being made, especially when you consider Barney's perfectionism at the time.

I'm also a big fan of this track.

Does anyone have any information on the background to the track/lyrics/influences & inspiration if anything cited?

I'm just wondering if it was a cover at all ? Can't say I've ever heard of this being the case and it is typically New Order in sound. Maybe we will find out one day.

Originally posted by Known Pleasures I'm just wondering if it was a cover at all ? Can't say I've ever heard of this being the case and it is typically New Order in sound. Maybe we will find out one day.

I can't remember anyone saying it's a cover... it is credited to the band members on all official releases I have (going back to the original official 12" with the generic 'Peel Sessions' sleeve - the first one of the series!).