Dixie Chicks' Cover of Fleetwood Mac's 'Landslide' Named Billboard's Best of All Time

Jacqueline Burt CoteSun, August 30, 2026 at 2:23 AM UTC

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Plenty of classic bands have inspired popular cover versions of their songs over the years, but Fleetwood Mac has to be one of the most covered groups of all time. From Elton John‘s take on “Don’t Stop” to Hole’s version of “Gold Dust Woman,” Fleetwood Mac’s catalog has been reimagined in just about every genre of music…and one countrified cover of “Landslide” went on to become a bigger commercial hit than the original.

“Landslide” originally appeared on the 1975 album Fleetwood Mac, but wasn’t released as a single until 1998, when a live version from the reunion album The Dance went #51 on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart and #10 on the Adult Contemporary chart. Of course, the poignant track, about love and loss and aging, was a fan-favorite for decades, despite its lack of chart presence.

“I wrote ‘Landslide’ in 1973, when I was 27, and I did already feel old in a lot of ways. I’d been working as a waitress and a cleaning lady for years. I was tired,” Stevie Nicks told the New York Times in 2014.

Decades later, when Natalie Maines of the Dixie Chicks (now known as just the Chicks) was about the same age as Nicks when she wrote “Landslide,” the country trio had a massive success with their cover of the song.

Released as the second single from their 2002 album, Home, the Dixie Chicks’ version peaked at #10 on the Billboard Hot 100 and the Billboard Hot Country Songs charts, going all the way to #1 on the Billboard Adult Contemporary chart (where it stayed for seven weeks in 2003). Nearly twenty years later, in 2022, Billboard ranked the Dixie Chicks’ “Landslide” as #1 on a list of the “20 Best Fleetwood Mac Covers.”

The same year the Dixie Chicks released their take on “Landslide,” Nicks performed the song with the group at VH1 Divas Las Vegas.

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“I can remember [writing] it and seeing it through my eyes when I was, gosh, in my early 20s and then through my eyes all the way up until now — and through you guys’ eyes,” Nicks said at the time, per Far Out. “It’s really quite an amazing metamorphosis for this song from generation to generation to generation, and I’m so proud to be a part of it.”

In a 2008 interview with Oprah Winfrey, Nicks called Maines her “favorite person to sing with, ever,” adding, “I could happily be a part of the Dixie Chicks. Even though they’re billed as country artists, they’re very rock ‘n’ roll.”

For Lindsey Buckingham, however, the Dixie Chicks (and their “Landslide”) weren’t rock ‘n’ roll enough.

“’Landslide’ is a great song, but I don’t want anyone to get the funny idea about Fleetwood Mac and country,” Buckingham told Guitar World in 2003. “Somebody at our label was talking about how we should broaden our audience, and they started talking about putting us on Country Music Television. I had to say, ‘Whoa! Stop right there.’ There’s a certain kind of profile you want to put out there. And that isn’t it.”

Related: The True Story Behind the Iconic Fleetwood Mac Performance Fans Still Can’t Get Over

This story was originally published by Parade on Aug 30, 2026, where it first appeared in the Entertainment section. Add Parade as a Preferred Source by clicking here.

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Source: “AOL Entertainment”