diff --git a/analyzeCommits.js b/analyzeCommits.js
index 317004d..2303077 100644
--- a/analyzeCommits.js
+++ b/analyzeCommits.js
@@ -1,6 +1,7 @@
 const analyzeCommits = require('@semantic-release/commit-analyzer')
 const SemanticReleaseError = require('@semantic-release/error')
 const execSync = require('child_process').execSync;
+const lastTag = require('./lastTag');
 
 const until = f => array => {
   const first = array[0];
@@ -13,15 +14,8 @@ const until = f => array => {
 };
 
 const lastTaggedRelease = () => {
-  let sha;
-
-  try {
-    sha = execSync('git rev-list -1 `git describe --tags --abbrev=0 --match "v[0-9]*"`', {
-      encoding: 'utf8'
-    }).trim();
-  } catch(e) {}
-
-  return sha;
+  const tag = lastTag({ branch: '', dev: false });
+  execSync(`git rev-list -1 ${tag}`, { encoding: 'utf8' }).trim();
 };
 
 module.exports = function (pluginConfig, config, cb) {
diff --git a/lastTag.js b/lastTag.js
index 17aa4ce..4370245 100644
--- a/lastTag.js
+++ b/lastTag.js
@@ -1,16 +1,10 @@
 const execSync = require('child_process').execSync;
 
-const lastTag = () => {
-    let sha;
-
-    try {
-        sha = execSync(
-            'git describe --tags --match "v[0-9]*" --exclude="*dev*" --abbrev=0 origin/master',
-            { encoding: 'utf8' }
-        ).trim();
-    } catch(e) {}
-
-    return sha;
-}
+const lastTag = ({ branch = 'origin/master', dev = true } = {}) => {
+  const exclude = dev ? ' --exclude="*dev*"' : '';
+  return execSync(`git describe --tags --match "v[0-9]*" ${exclude} --abbrev=0 ${branch} || true`,
+      { encoding: 'utf8' }
+  ).trim();
+};
 
 module.exports = lastTag;