Louder Than Words

"Louder Than Words" is a single by trance-rock singer Violetta DiNozzo, and the first to be taken from her third studio album "Divide & Conquer". In the UK it was reduced from a full single to a digital buzz release, however the song was given a full release in America as the lead single from the US edition of the album. The song became a top 5 digital hit for Violetta, setting a good pre-cursor for the era's general success. In the US it was moderately successful, what with the album being the least commercial for the US market.

Background
"Louder Than Words" was written and originally recorded by Klayton, of the one-man band Celldweller. Since the song was in the general style of Violetta's third album, she decided to record her own cover of it with the Darling Violetta Project. It was going to be the lead single from the DVP album in January, as a double A-side with "Rip It Up" from the anniversary edition of "Just Another Girl", but this was scrapped after the DVP as a commercial entity was unpopular with the general public. Violetta kept the single on as a single from the era, having already shot a video for it. The song was released as the lead single in the US, but its full release was cancelled in the UK. Violetta kept it on as a digital promo single for the UK market, since the preparations for the single were already made.

Reception
The song was decently-received as a proper comeback, after the temporary return Violetta made with her debut album's re-release. Its reception wasn't great enough to be a proper single however, so presumably it would not have fared as well had it been the lead single in the UK. The song was made available for airplay but it did not chart; however the comeback hype was enough to help the song hit the top 5 on the digital chart. In America, the song took a bit of time to catch on because it was not as commercial as her previous output, but eventually it reached platinum sales and moderate chart impact.

US Promo CD

 * 1) Louder Than Words (Album Version)
 * 2) Louder Than Words (Instrumental)

US Digital Release

 * 1) Louder Than Words (Album Version)
 * 2) Louder Than Words (Manufactured Superstars Radio Edit)

UK Digital EP

 * 1) Louder Than Words (Album Version)
 * Go, Baby Go (Album Version)
 * 1) Louder Than Words (Cedric Gervais Vocal Mix)
 * 2) Louder Than Words (Manufactured Superstars Remix)
 * 3) Louder Than Words (The Glitch Mob Remix)

Music Video
The video opens with a city skyline; a large tower is seen in-frame, with the company logo lit up. The intro music for ‘Louder Than Words’ kicks in as we see a person on a motorbike roaring down the city streets. The mystery person stops outside an abandoned building and produces a key, sliding it into the lock and stepping inside the building. Inside, the room and everything in it is covered with dust. We see a hand wiping over a horizontal computer screen which lights up and the mystery person is digitized and sucked into the computer. Intercut through all this are shots of Violetta in a black space sitting backwards on a chair with wind blowing her hair around.

As the full band kicks in, the mystery person is dropped straight into a Tron-inspired light-cycle battle arena. The person is joined by a number of other blue-coloured light-cycles, pitted against an equal number of red-coloured cycles. Quickly, one of the blue team is destroyed when a red cycle cuts a path in front of it. The cycle and its rider shatter into bytes. During the first verse we see Violetta dancing around the chair as she sings, climbing all over it and kicking it about.

The light-cycle battle heats up as the mystery person on the blue team sneaks up from underneath a red cycle, leaps over the cycle’s head when jumping from a ramp and cuts if off causing it to smash into a million bytes. Through all this we see even more of Violetta in the black space with the chair sliding around the floor as the chair spins madly around her, and shots of the chair jumping on top of her as she lays down. One particular shot sees her standing on the back of the chair as it spins around beneath her.

As we reach the second verse the scene changes from the light-cycle battle. We see a dark-lit city and a tower with a revolving nightclub. An elevator rides up a shaft of light, and we are taken inside the club where Violetta is singing the verse to a man, pointing at him accusingly then walking away as he starts to follow. We see DJs in suits controlling the music inside the club (timed to the flow of the song) and the bright lighting within the club getting dark as the ‘host’ of the club makes an appearance.

As the lights come back up, the man Violetta was singing to continues to follow her around the club, tripping over furniture as she makes her way toward the exit. Violetta raises her fists to the entrance and slams down on it as various patrons reach to stop her, but they are too late as she manages to bust a circuit in the door causing sparks to fly. Violetta is next seen driving away from the digital city in a light car (similar to the light-cycle from earlier in the video) as the disco-like instrumental break kicks in. A chair somehow flies onto the ‘road’ from out of nowhere, causing Violetta to spin the car out of control in an attempt to avoid it.

During the bridge, we see Violetta climbing out of the car and standing in front of it. She sings to the camera as digital rain falls down upon her and the car. We cut back to the black scene with Violetta and the chair. She picks the chair up and it magically transforms into a cane which she slams down onto the floor. It bounces back up and there is a quick pull-back to reveal Violetta standing on a platform with a gigantic metal ring circling around her. We cut to a bridge, where we see the mystery person from all through the video on a light-cycle headed away from the city. The person reaches an invisible barrier and seemingly disintegrates. Turns out they’re only ‘escaping’ from the computer as we find ourselves back in the real-world location from before, and we learn the mystery person was Violetta all along.

Chart Performance
"Louder Than Words" only had a short run on the UK digital chart, but it did well enough that it hit the top 5 on the download chart. Over its two week run, it sold 67,568 digital copies. Despite being available for airplay, it did not impact the chart. In the US, the song took a bit of time to catch on, but it eventually made the top 20 on pop radio and the top 40 on overall airplay. Digital sales were slow and steady, but it eventually hit platinum in sales with a top 40 peak on the Hot 100.