Certain Songs #2108: Romeo Void – “Never Say Never”

Album: Never Say Never EP
Year: 1981.

. . .

Romeo Void so quickly followed up their debut album with a four-song EP, it was clear they’d recorded a song and they couldn’t wait for people to hear it. And they were right, as the EP was named for not just their greatest song, but one of the great dance-punk songs of all time, the timeless “Never Say Never,” which stretched out over six glorious minutes and basically dwarfed the other songs on the EP.

While they did stick a shorter version of “Never Say Never” as the opening track of their second album, 1982’s Benefactor and a remixed version on their 1991 best of Warm, In Your Coat, the original is the one to seek out. Opening with guitarist Peter Woods scratching his guitar like he’s auditioning for the Gang of Four, and almost instantly falling into a groove with bassist Frank Zincavage and new drummer Larry Carter, the band is already cooking by the time Deborah Iyall starts singing, her voice distorted and reverbed.

If time itself was his demeanor
There’d be no sunlight or a glimmer
Of sunlight landing on the street
Sunsuit girls must be discreet

Sunsuit girls must be discreet
Nursing their fathers locked inside
They masqueraded as his bride

Now, if you could even make out the lyrics, you might be wondering exactly what a “sunsuit girl” was (and in fact, I always thought she was saying “some said girls”), but of course, it doesn’t matter, because hardly missing a beat, her voice now doubled and tripled, bathed in distortion and reverb, Iyall invokes one of the all-time devastatingly confusing choruses, combining a come-on and a put-down at the same time.

I might like you better if we slept together
I might like you better if we slept together
I might like you better if we slept together
But there’s something in your eyes that says maybe…
That’s never
Never say never

Holy hatefuck, Batman!

That first chorus is followed by a doomy riffy solo from saxophonist Benjamin Rossi, smashing up against the relentless disco beat — check out how drummer Carter doubles Rossi’s sax riff with his snare without disturbing the groove even one iota — and also establishing a counter-hook to the chorus and setting up the second verse.

Slumped by the courthouse
With windburn skin
That man could give a fuck
About the grin on your face
As you walk by, randy as a goat
He’s sleeping on papers
But he’d be warm
In your coat

And it’s some time in the early 90s, and you’re in a crowd of people at a local club, dancing to this song cos the club has been experimenting with dance nights to subsidize the local bands they normally feature — and while you’re sad it’s come to this, you’re fine with supporting a club which has kinda become your evening home — and in the middle of the song, a woman in your social circle with whom you’ve had a, let’s say, contentious relationship with dances over to you and when the second chorus hits, starts mouthing it at you with a smile on her face.

I might like you better if we slept together
I might like you better if we slept together
I might like you better if we slept together
But there’s something in your eyes that says maybe…
That’s never
Never say never

But that didn’t work either.

And once again, Bossi comes in with his sax hook, setting up the bridge, Iyall’s voice now so bathed in reverb, it’s circled back upon itself as Woods’ guitar starts climbing on the back of the rest of the song.

There’s no easy way
To lose your sight
On the street, on the stairs
Who’s on your flight
Old couple walks by
As ugly as sin
But he’s got her
And she’s got him

I can see why, on their major-label debut, the powers that be at Columbia basically nixed the second half of “Never Say Never,” because it gets ever more unhinged: first Bossi trades his sax hook for noisy skronky solos and Iyall’s chants of “I might like you better if we slept together” and “never say never,” get drowned in oceans of echo and distortion. And yet and even finds room for one last verse, which is the darkest of them all.

Sun seems to move
Across the sky so slow
It’s us who’s turning
With nowhere to go
Sun seems to move
Across the sky so slow
Us who’s turning
With nowhere to go

After that, it’s just an ever-changing wall of noise: guitars, sax and vocals bouncing every which way, anchored only by the never-stopping relentless beat and of course “I might like you better if we slept together” until it finally dances away from you at the fade, knowing that if you follow its come-on, things aren’t really gonna change.

“Never Say Never” is a titanic feat, and while it wasn’t really a mainstream hit in its time, it was absolutely an underground hit, and one of those songs whose afterlife has forever dwarfed its initial impact.

“Never Say Never”

“Never Say Never” live in 1984

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