Overstreet and Schlitz came up with "When You Say Nothing at All" at the end of an otherwise unproductive day. Strumming a guitar, trying to write their next song, they were coming up empty. "As we tried to find another way to say nothing, we came up with the song", Overstreet later told author Ace Collins. They thought the song was OK, but nothing special. When Keith Whitley heard it, he loved it, and was not going to let it get away. Earlier, he had recorded another Overstreet-Schlitz composition that became a No. 1 hit for another artist - Randy Travis' "On the Other Hand." Whitley did not plan to let "When You Say Nothing at All" meet the same fate.
Content
In the first verse the narrator describes how their significant other communicates best non-verbally. The chorus echoes this idea, highlighting "the smile on your face", "the truth in your eye", and the "touch of your hand". The second verse describes being held by the other person as "drowning out the crowd" and that "what is being said between your heart and mine" could never be defined.
Keith Whitley
RCA released "When You Say Nothing at All" as the follow-up single to the title song of Whitley's Don't Close Your Eyes album. The former song already had hit No. 1 on the BillboardHot Country Singles chart, his first chart-topper after three prior singles made the top 10. "When You Say Nothing at All" entered the Hot Country Singles chart on September 17, 1988, at No. 61, and gradually rose to the top, where it stayed for two weeks at the end of the year. It was the second of five consecutive chart-topping singles for Whitley, who did not live to see the last two, as he died on May 9, 1989 of alcohol poisoning. "Keith did a great job singin' that song," co-composer Schlitz told author Tom Roland. "He truly sang it from the heart." In 2004, Whitley's original was ranked 12th among CMT's 100 Greatest Love Songs. It was sung by Sara Evans on the show. As of February 2015, the song has sold 599,000 digital copies in the US after it became available for download.
Chart performance
Alison Krauss version
In 1995, Alison Krauss covered the song with the group Union Station for a tribute album to Whitley titled '. After Krauss's cover began to receive unsolicited airplay, BNA Records, the label that had released the album, issued Krauss' version to radio in January 1995. That version, also featured on Krauss' compilation ', peaked at No. 3 on the BillboardHot Country Singles & Tracks chart, and a commercial single reached No. 2 on the same magazine's Hot Country Singles Sales chart.. The B-side of the single was Keith Whitley's "Charlotte's in North Carolina", which was another previously unreleased track featured on the Tribute album. Its success, as well as that of the album, caught Krauss by surprise. "It's a freak thing," she told a Los Angeles Times reporter in March 1995. "It's kinda ticklin' us all. We haven't had anything really chart before. At all. Isn't it funny though? We don't know what's goin' on....The office said, 'Hey, it's charting,' and we're like, 'Huh?'" While Krauss' version was on the charts, Mike Cromwell, then the production director at WMIL-FM in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, concocted a duet merging elements of Krauss' version with Whitley's original hit version. The "duet" garnered national attention, and it spread from at least Philadelphia to Albuquerque, and has been heard on radio stations in California as well. This "duet" was however never officially serviced to radio and has never been available commercially. Krauss' recording won the 1995 CMA award for "Single of the Year". The song has been featured a couple of times in the soap opera The Young and the Restless. Krauss' version was also used in the 1999 motion picture "The Other Sister". The song has sold 468,000 digital downloads as of May 2017.
"When You Say Nothing at All" was released as the debut solo single by Irish singer-songwriter Ronan Keating. The song was recorded in 1999 for the soundtrack to the film Notting Hill and also appeared on Keating's debut solo album, Ronan. The song was released on July 26, 1999, in the United Kingdom. It peaked at number one in the UK, Ireland and New Zealand. In the UK, the single was certified gold. In 2003, Keating re-recorded the song as a duet with Mexican singer Paulina Rubio in spanglish, which was released in Spain, Mexico and Latin America to promote Keating's second studio album, Destination. The popular Spanish website Jenesaispop described the song as one of the most "squeaky" bilingual collaboration, while Victor González of GQ Spain praised the collaboration as "great" in an article of unusual collaborations. In Brazil, Ronan chose the Brazilian singer Deborah Blando to re-record the song in English and English/Portuguese for the 10 Years Of Hits album exclusive for that country. A music video was recorded for this version with Deborah.
"When You Say Nothing at All " feat. Paulina Rubio – 4:17
Charts
Weekly charts
Year-end charts
Certifications
Other covers
The Italian-Ukrainian-Brazilian singer Deborah Blando recorded "When You Say Nothing at All" in English and Portuguese for the Brazilian version of the song, which featured on the Brazilian version of Destination. The single reached the top 10 in the Latin charts. Burmese singer Zaw Paing also made a Burmese version cover. American country singer Dylan Scott released a cover on his 2019 album An Old Memory.
