Natalie Maines: 10 Years Later

by Julian Spivey
Ten years ago Natalie Maines, the lead singer of the Dixie Chicks, was one of the biggest and most popular performers in the genre of country music. And, then she did something that we as American citizens thankfully have the right to do … she opened her mouth and gave her opinion on something.
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At a concert in London in March of 2003, Maines stated that the Dixie Chicks were not in favor of the Iraq War and she said that she was “ashamed” that President George W. Bush was “from Texas.” This statement came just months after Maines criticized fellow country music star Toby Keith’s uber-patriotic “Courtesy of the Red, White & Blue (The Angry American)” for being “ignorant” and making “country music sound ignorant.”

The two statements started a feud with Keith, who began to display a backdrop at shows on his tour featuring a doctored photo of Maines with Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, according to BBC News. In May of 2003, Maines then wore a shirt with the acronym “F.U.T.K.” while performing with the Dixie Chicks at the Academy of Country Music Awards. At the time Maines told the media that the acronym stood for “Freedom, United, Together in Kindness” and not a thinly veiled dig at Keith. However, in Barbara Kopple and Cecilia Peck’s 2006 documentary “Dixie Chicks: Shut Up and Sing” Maines finally admitted the shirt did indeed stand for “Fuck You, Toby Keith.”

Following these rebellious moments from Maines much of the country music industry – radio, insiders and fans alike – turned their back on the Dixie Chicks and essentially banished the award-winning group from Nashville. Radio stations refused to play the trio’s music and fans across the country held Dixie Chicks album burnings and trashings.

To this day Maines and the Dixie Chicks haven’t really been welcomed back into the world of country music, despite finding some critical success with their 2006 album “Taking the Long Way,” which would go on to win five Grammy Awards including the most coveted and prestigious Album of the Year and featured the Record of the Year and Song of the Year winning “Not Ready to Make Nice,” which signified they weren’t going to be apologizing for Maines’ statements and actions anytime soon.

The group hasn’t released an album since and is currently on hiatus. However, Maines has decided to return to making music with her first solo album, “Mother,” released in May. The album, which is not a country music album, was met with decent reviews and much press. In an infamous interview with Rolling Stone in May, Maines was unabashed in her discontent at the country music genre that had turned its back on her and her group and bashed the genre for many things, especially its lack of “subtle lyrics” and “poetry.”

So, not much has happened really in the 10 long years since Maines and the Dixie Chicks were unceremoniously kicked out of country music – country music and its fans still seem to blackball the group and many fans seem to still resent Maines and her opinions and Maines has a clear resentment toward the genre that once made her a superstar and household name. 

Ten years ago I was a 15-year old kid who really didn’t give a damn about politics, as most 15-year olds don’t and probably shouldn’t. In the coming years though I would grow discontented with President Bush’s policies and war that we never should have gotten into in the first place and as a result lost a lot of fine men and women – some of that discontent actually came as a result of listening to music, like country legend Merle Haggard’s fantastic “America First” and “Where’s All the Freedom?” But, at 15 as a country music fan all I knew was that I liked Toby Keith’s music and I didn’t care for the Dixie Chicks’ music. In the 10 years since, I’ve mostly been disappointed with Keith’s music choices and have yet to make an attempt to get into the Dixie Chicks’ old tunes – for better or worse.

And, so my 15-year old self taking Maines’ blasts at Keith as an insult to a musician I liked decided that I would side with Keith. After all, it wouldn’t be very hard to boycott a group I never actually cared for in the first place. Despite my siding with Keith, I can honestly say even my immature self never for a moment hated Maines or felt like destroying some of the Dixie Chicks’ records or paraphernalia because at 15 I was more mature than those clowns who couldn’t accept that somebody might have a different opinion than they did.

My 2013 self sides with Maines on her statements and actions of 2003. I too grew to become ashamed of President Bush for his sending our troops into a bogus war and for numerous other atrocities he wrought or helped to have wrought on this country – many of which we’re still having trouble getting out of five years after his presidency. I even don’t care today what Maines said about Keith and his song, which I can say I still sort of like, but not as much as I did at the time. Keith has always claimed that his song was written through the eyes of what his father would have thought had he lived to see the tragedy of 9/11. It’s a fair and accurate assessment of what a lot of Americans felt after the terrorist attacks and thus the reason it became a huge hit for the Okie singer.

However, my 2013 self also knows full well that Maines needs to, somewhat, get the hell over what happened to her. She doesn’t ever have to get over how she was treated by those wanting to disown or banish her, but she does have to stop this almost childish resentment she has toward the genre of country music as a whole, specifically the utter asininity of the “country music lacks subtlety and poetry” statement to Rolling Stone. Just ask Kris Kristofferson if his music lacks subtlety or poetry.    

Maines is not dumb. She knows what she said was both untrue and an unfair generalization, but she’s still so pissed off at the genre and industry for doing what they did to her that she will take every opportunity she gets to lambaste it.

What happened to Maines and her Dixie Chicks bandmates Martie Maguire and Emily Robison (who are the most unfairly punished people in the whole scenario) was horrible, wrong and unfair and makes me feel sorry for them. However, every time Maines says something ignorant or bitter like her most recent swipe at country music a little bit of that sympathy fades away.