Never Say Die!
Warner Brothers 3186-2
Vertigo 9124-101
Released September 28, 1978
Track Listing
- Never Say Die
- Johnny Blade
- Junior’s Eyes
- A Hard Road
- Shock Wave
- Air Dance
- Over to You
- Breakout
- Swinging the Chain
Personnel
- Tony Iommi – Guitar
- Geezer Butler – Bass
- Bill Ward – Drums
- Ozzy Osbourne – Vocals
- Gerald Woodruffe – Keyboards
- Mike Lewis – Strings on “She’s Gone”
Production
- Produced by Black Sabbath
- Engineered by Robin Black & Spock Wall
- Recorded & Mixed at Criteria Studios (Miami, FL) by Tony Iommi & Robin Black
- Also recorded at Sounds Interchange, Toronto Canada
- Mastered at Warner Bros Studios by Tony Iommi & Bob Hata
Tony’s Thoughts
The only time I ever sung on a Black Sabbath record (A Hard Road, with Geezer). If you heard my audio track on its own, you’d see why I never sang again in Black Sabbath. Leave that to the guys who can actually sing.
This album is one of my top Sabbath discs. It always gets slated, even by the band (except Bill), but to me its inventive and progressive. The song writing is superb and underneath the strange tinny sound there are some super heavy riffs. Johnny Blade, Juniors Eyes, Hard Road, Air Dance are excellent tracks, with great lead solos from Tony. Swinging the Chain with Bill on vocals is superb also, again some very heavy Iommi riffage in there. I think Bills drumming through out this disc is one of his best performances. When hes grooving away on the ride cymbal and rolling the drum fills in Juniors Eyes in in heaven. A sadly over looked album when the band were criticised for being too progressive, a great shame. I love this album, always will. Never ever say die!
Totally agree! Maybe not a favorite of the band, but such a great album! The band, especially Tony had evolved alot over the ten years together. Listening to Tony playing on the first album(which I love) and then on Never Say Die, it’s amazing how much his lead playing had evolved.Most of the other players from that era kind of stagnated, but you can hear that he was always pushing himself further with his technique and tone. My hero!