Professional ratings
Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic
BBC Music	(positive)
Entertainment Weekly	B
The Independent	(mixed)
Los Angeles Times
Robert Christgau
Rolling Stone
The Rolling Stone Album Guide
The Spokesman-Review	(positive)

Never Say Never is the second studio album by American singer Brandy. Released by Atlantic Records on June 9, 1998 in United States, Norwood's label consulted David Foster and upcoming producer Rodney "Darkchild" Jerkins and his team to work with her on the record, the latter of who went on to craft the majority of the album and would evolve as her mentor and head producer on succeeding projects in the 2000s.

The lyrical themes on the album include the singer's personal experiences with love, monogamy, media bias, and maturity. Influenced by Mariah Carey and Whitney Houston, Norwood wanted to present a more mature facet of herself with the album, incorporating a ballad-heavy style and an adult contemporary feel into her urban-pop sound for the album. Upon its release, Never Say Never facilitated Norwood in becoming a viable recording artist with media–crossing appeal. It debuted at number three on the US Billboard 200 chart, selling 160,000 copies in its first week, and remained 28 weeks within top 20 of the chart. Seven of the fourteen songs were chosen as singles, with two becoming worldwide number one hits, one becoming an international hit, and one becoming a domestic hit. Worldwide, the album sold 16 million copies.

It became both her highest-selling album to date on most international markets, and won numerous awards and accolades, including a Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal for "The Boy Is Mine." The album was supported by Brandy's Never Say Never World Tour in 1999, which featured soldout performances in the United States, Europe, Asia, Africa and Canada.

After a lengthy musical break, which saw Norwood establishing a flourishing acting career with her sitcom Moesha. She eventually entered to the recording studios on October 1997, to begin working on her second studio album. Barely satisfied with the material that was presented to her. However, the recording of the album was postponed several times as Norwood felt that many songs wouldn't express what she wanted to tell at this point of her career. "Many of the songs I heard were not 'me'," the singer stated during a promotional interview with Jet in 1999, "And If I can't feel it, then I won't sing it. I'm not the little girl I was when I made my first record. My voice is a strong instrument now; my vocals come from both my heart and my diaphragm. My heart because I matured in the four years since the last album; I'm more emotionally there." One song written for Norwood was "Candy", but she didn't like the song, because "it was feeling that she was too old for that." Two years later, the song was given to a fellow pop star Mandy Moore, that has made her internationally a successful artist.

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