Chicks no strangers to controversy

The Dixie Chicks (from left: Martie Maguire, Natalie Maines, and Emily Robison) say the Bush incident has made them stronger.

One morning three years ago, the Dixie Chicks woke to find they were no longer sweethearts of the rodeo. Overnight, they had become America's most political group.

And, in the eyes of many, these sexy, musically skilled Texas gals, were the new public enemy number one.

When lead singer Natalie Maines said "Just so you know, we're ashamed the President of the United States is from Texas," during a London show in March 2003, the backlash was nasty.

Many of the folks at home didn't like the band's politics. Nevertheless, they still appeared discreetly nude on the cover of US magazine Entertainment Weekly in May of that year to emphasise their point further.

But the resentment worsened, reaching a peak when Maines received death threats forcing them to have metal detectors installed at concert venues. Even now though, as the title of their single declares, they're Not Ready To Make Nice just yet.

While the Chicks' new album, Taking the Long Way, is not a political one, it hits back at critics.

Multi-instrumentalist Emily Robison, who is on the phone from her home in San Antonio, Texas, says there was no way they were going to lie down and "leave things be".

"We felt like we needed to be honest about what happened. It would have been very odd for us to come out with an album full of light-hearted dance tunes," she says, laughing. "So the writing of this album was very therapeutic for us."

The thing that hurt the band most was many detractors were their Texan fans.

The locals of Maines' hometown, Lubbock, disowned her.

That town, in the heart of the US Bible Belt, is dubbed the Dust Bowl - "When it rains, it rains mud," says Robison, sarcastically. The area is well known as a stronghold of Republican Christian values.

On the song, Lubbock or Leave It, Maines calls it a "fools' paradise" with "more churches than trees" and passes comment on the problems facing young people in the town.

The song was inspired by the documentary, The Education of Shelby Knox, about a Lubbock girl campaigning to get better sex education in schools.

"Lubbock has the proud title of being the city with the most teenage pregnancies and STDs, per capita, in the country," explains Robison.

"It's just one of those things where they won't teach sex education because it's wrong and evil, yet a large number of their kids are getting into trouble.

"So Natalie had a lot of issues to get off her chest," says Robison.

She is quick to point out that the album is not politically motivated. "There's a few things, as far as how we feel [politically], but it's an emotional album based on what happened. It did stir a lot of stuff up and that's what songwriting is about - just responding to what's going on in your life.

"We've gone through every emotion in the book. We definitely have perspectives on everything now, three years later, but overall it was mainly disappointment that people couldn't speak their minds. We were also sad that people could have such hatred for us which meant there was a certain sense of fear."

But the Bush incident has made them stronger, and closer as a band, and the result is their best album since 1998's breakthrough, Wide Open Spaces.

That album, and the follow-up Fly, both sold more than 10 million copies in the US making the Dixie Chicks one of a handful of groups having multiple albums with diamond status. In New Zealand the new album is currently in the top 10.

While the anti-Bush backlash meant they lost some country music fans it also has potential to gain them a new audience and their popularity remains high. They made Time magazine's top 100 most important people list, and they were on the cover of the May 22 issue.

Robison: "When you lose fans because of your opinions, you're gonna gain some, too. Our thought process at this point is not to change who we are to get back those people who were so angry. You have to move on, and say, 'This is who we are and if you connect with us great, if you don't that's fine too'.

"And," continues Robison, "there's also a lot of different subjects [besides politics] on the album that we talk about."

Between them the trio have seven children and songs like, Baby Hold On and Lullaby, are about motherhood, while So Hard is about infertility, The Long Way Round deals with their success, and Silent House reflects on a relative with Alzheimers.

In terms of sound, the new album produced by mega-producer Rick Rubin has an even wider appeal.

Says Rubin: "I think this should sound like a great rock act making a country album, not a country act making a rock album."

For the first time the band co-wrote every song on Taking the Long Way, which is their seventh album. Before, they have written separately or used material by other songwriters.

"That was huge for us because we're always willing, yet lazy writers, and we've always said the best song wins. But this time Rick was the one who facilitated us writing all of it. He said, 'Y'all have a lot to say and I can't imagine y'all singing a song that's not about you or your life or your experiences'."

Rubin has worked with many bands including Run DMC, Soundgarden, Red Hot Chili Peppers, and recently gave new life to Neil Diamond (see sidebar).

Another new dimension to the album was the many guest players, including the Chili Peppers' drummer, Chad Smith, singer/songwriter Pete Yorn, and Gary Louris from country rockers the Jayhawks.

"The way we're used to recording is, 'Time is money and if we're going to record, by golly it better end up on the album'," says Robison. "But [Rubin] is very relaxed and time is not of the essence, and it'll be done when it's done.

"It took a while to train us to think like: 'Just because that guitar player, or horn player is coming in, it doesn't mean it's going to be on the album'. Essentially, we were free to experiment and explore all our own ideas."

They've come a long way since the late 80s when Maguire (a top US fiddler) and Robison, her sister, formed the Dixie Chicks with bass player Laura Lynch and guitarist Robin Lynn Macy. After Lynch left the band in 1992 and Macy departed after their third album, Shouldn't A Told You That, in 1995, Maines joined as singer.

The Dixie Chicks were about to become more than just a band. With the release of Wide Open Spaces they became a phenomenon - especially in the US.

"I guess when Wide Open Spaces came out I thought, 'This is it. This is the top. This is the pinnacle'. But there's many levels because then you get more opportunities and you sell even more records. But I had a new moment like that the other day when we played the Time Magazine top 100. That was so cool," she says, excitedly.

The Chicks were special guests at the swanky do and played three songs at the dinner, which included everyone from Martha Stewart to Will Smith to Paul Simon, and a few US senators thrown in for good measure. "It was one of those moments where I was like, 'Okay, I don't know how we got here'."

All the guests got to take the the new single home in their gift bags and New Zealand will be getting their own bit of Dixie Chicks' action next year.

"Hopefully we'll see y'all at the beginning of 07 - we gon' tour," she says in what is the first real sign of her southern drawl.

See, she is a good southern gal. No matter what the locals think.

LOWDOWN

WHO: The Dixie Chicks
WHAT: America's most political band
LINE-UP: Natalie Maines (vocals); Emily Robison (banjo/guitar); Martie Maguire (fiddle).
NEW ALBUM: Taking the Long Way, out now.
ESSENTIAL ALBUMS: Wide Open Spaces (1998); Fly (1999); Home (2002).