It starts with the voice. Before you notice the words, before you detect the gently curling melodies tugging them along, this is what hits you first: It's warm and rich and touched with a soft Southern twang, as likely to swing down into its earthy lower register as to arch upwards into a hopeful trill; it's steady and sure but flecked with a certain weary sadness that stops you dead, draws you near. It's beautiful. It knows something.