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June 17, 2006

Dixie Chicks still don't get it

Some bloke from the Daily Telegraph has a sit down with the Dixie Chicks, to see how their Bush-bashing, country-fan slamming remarks have affected their careers, three years on.

It seems, how shall I say this, that the Chicks are doing everything possible to further alienate the fans that made them one of the top acts on the country music scene. Check out the opening 'graph of the profile.

Will it be the salmon teriyaki with organic greens, or asparagus tempura and tuna sashimi? As the waiter hovers with pencil poised, the Dixie Chicks debate the menu with the practised air of professional restaurant critics. The Chicks have traditionally been branded a country band, but clearly it's some time since their diet consisted of ribs, tacos and pancakes.

'Cause country fans don't like nothin' that ain't battered an' deep fried. Corndogs an' Bud is whut a body needs. Yee-haw!

Sisters Emily Robison and Martie Maguire project a polished Fifth Avenue elegance, and vocalist Natalie Maines is a vision of sculpted cheekbones and smoky eye-shadow.

With their origins as bouffant-haired ingénues playing bluegrass music long forgotten, the Chicks are in Miami to attend a Sony BMG conference, where their new album, Taking the Long Way, is high on the corporate agenda. It's their first release since the group weathered the storm of outrage triggered by Maines's expression of shame that President Bush was from her home state of Texas. Although they've sold 30 million albums, the company was concerned about their commercial future.

When Maines made her comment on March 10 2003, 10 days before Operation Iraqi Freedom unleashed "shock and awe" over Baghdad, the Dixie Chicks were probably the biggest act in country music. Yet within days, their music vanished from the charts and the airwaves, apoplectic rednecks crushed piles of their CDs with tractors, and the FBI was feverishly monitoring death threats against the trio. It was the most heinous pop-star outrage since Ozzy Osbourne urinated on the Alamo.

Did that Brit really say that country fans were climbing on their tractors? To indulge in vein-bulging hate crimes against CDs? Now that's funny.

"The reaction was as if Natalie had said 'Death to the President' or something," says violinist and vocalist Maguire.

"It was the bullying and the scare factor," shudders banjo and guitar player Robison. "It was like the McCarthy days, and it was almost like the country was unrecognisable."

The level of debate can be gauged from the way Maines was compared to "Hanoi Jane" Fonda, who was photographed manning a North Vietnamese anti-aircraft gun at the height of the Vietnam war.

My God! People criticized the Dixie Chicks! Stopped buying their CDs! Exercised their First Amendment rights to express disagreement with their politics! It's exactly like the dark days of the McCarthy-era blacklist.

The Chicks can't hide their disgust at the lack of support they received from other country performers. "A lot of artists cashed in on being against what we said or what we stood for because that was promoting their career, which was a horrible thing to do," says Robison.

As opposed to kissing Brit ass while touring in the U.K., or sucking up to the rock and roll crowd -- not a flag-waving bunch -- to sell your music.

"A lot of pandering started going on, and you'd see soldiers and the American flag in every video. It became a sickening display of ultra-patriotism."

"The entire country may disagree with me, but I don't understand the necessity for patriotism," Maines resumes, through gritted teeth. "Why do you have to be a patriot? About what? This land is our land? Why? You can like where you live and like your life, but as for loving the whole country… I don't see why people care about patriotism."

Well, that's apparent. Allow me to provide a reason why some "people care about patriotism."

capt.1051133564.dixie_chicks_ny123.jpgburka.jpg

How about a picture from the Dixie Chicks' post-Bush Bashing U.S. publicity tour, left, and their poster from the Dixie Chicks 2011 Islamic States of America Tour, right.

There can be no rational explanation of how Maines's remark came to drive a red-hot poker into America's divided soul, but it's only now that some of the poison has begun to dissipate.

Early concerns about the premature demise of the Chicks' career subsided when the furiously unapologetic single Not Ready to Make Nice became the most downloaded track on iTunes, despite a lack of radio airplay. Then the album went to number one on the Billboard 200 after selling half a million copies in the week after its release in America last month. It looks set to be their first UK top 10 album this Sunday.

[...]

[I]t would be disappointing if the album's thoughtful range of subject matter (from IVF to Alzheimer's) was overshadowed by the Bush episode.

"I think for longevity's sake, our music had to mature and we had to mature as people," says Maguire. "Not that this particular event had to happen, but it sped up the process for us and helped us make a record that's really meaningful to us, whether or not other people see that."

AIDS, Alzheimers; piss on patriotism, flag and country. That constitutes the Dixie Chicks maturing, as people and artists?

Okaaaay.

I'm glad they're engaged in producing music that's meaningful to them. And relieved that they understand that it probably won't appeal to many of us.

But give the martyrdom routine a break, will ya? I'm afraid that when it comes to the three gals I used to enjoy listening to, they're "Long time gone."

Posted by Mike Lief at June 17, 2006 06:24 AM | TrackBack

Comments

It's hard to grasp the stupidity that the rest of us were more affected by 9/11 than the Ditzy Chicks. But it seems to be true....

"A lot of pandering started going on, and you'd see soldiers and the American flag in every video. It became a sickening display of ultra-patriotism."

The dumbest chicks to cross the road since who cares when.

"The entire country may disagree with me, but I don't understand the necessity for patriotism," Maines resumes, through gritted teeth. "Why do you have to be a patriot? About what? This land is our land? Why? You can like where you live and like your life, but as for loving the whole country… I don't see why people care about patriotism."

Unbelievable. Chicks roaming free when they deserve to be stuffed in a cage. Does any liberal who truly craves peace care to defend these idiots?

Posted by: Vermont Neighbor at June 17, 2006 04:10 PM

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