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Dear Reader, you may have wondered to yourself as you read these pages whether I am the sort of person who overanalyzes everything. In answer I can offer only my two favorite things about the Dixie Chicks' cover of "Landslide", a recording I first encountered when, laid up sick in a motel room just outside San Luis Obispo city limits, I discovered through channel flipping and careful observation that every other music video on Country Music Television was this one.

Both of my favorite things are about the vocal harmonies, which throughout the song consist mostly of thirds (and fourths) tracking the melody line, above and below it. This is a time-honored approach in bluegrass and, you know, popular music in general. Heck, Western music. Maybe more.

My second-favorite thing is this: At the end of the song, after Natalie Maines sings "Well maybe" twice on her own, the other two join her on the third time through. The lower voice (I don't know who sings what) just tracks the melody, but the higher voice, while it starts out doing the same thing, then lifts up and follows its own melodic line, coming back down just after the other two cut out.

My favorite thing is this: Early in the song, Maines sings "Uh uh" (or "Ah ah"), and the other two sing above and below, but instead of singing along with her, they hold back half a measure. I picture the vocal lines as, God help me, fighter jets, just one visible at first and then the other two flanking out behind it. This means that, while the melody sustains a single note, the other two are singing a slightly different line in sixths, a gorgeous and underused interval. It's a small thing, but I really like it.