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It’s been 14 years since The Chicks released new music and a documentary on their country radio cancellation – but the film still has a lot to say on how we got here
When The Chicks, the Texas trio of singer Natalie Maines and sisters Emily Strayer and Martie Maguire, abruptly dropped the “Dixie” from their name in late June, they set forth a crystalline, encompassing mantra: “We want to meet this moment.”
The band, whose thumping proto-feminist, bluegrass-pop ballads made them the highest-selling female group of all time in the United States, made the decision partly in response to America’s racial reckoning after the death of George Floyd in police custody and partly due to longstanding discomfort with name’s romanticization of the Confederacy. It also mirrors the release of their first new music in 14 years: unbowed, unapologetic yet open to growth, soundtracked by a scorched-earth record of divorce and resilience with a title, Gaslighter, oft-invoked in the Trump presidency. Continue reading...