From CNN, 5/21/06:
http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/05/21/cover.story.tm/index.html

Dixie Chicks in the line of fire

Editor's note: The following is a summary of this week's Time magazine
cover story.

(Time.com) --

Natalie Maines is one of those people born middle finger first.

As a high school senior in Lubbock, Texas, she'd skip a class a day in
an attempt to prove that because she never got caught and some Mexican
students did, the system was racist.

After Maines joined the Dixie Chicks, and the Dixie Chicks became the
biggest-selling female group in music history -- with suspiciously
little cash to show for it -- she and her bandmates told their record
label, Sony, they were declaring themselves free agents.

(In the high school that is Nashville, this is way worse than skipping
class.)

Now that she's truly notorious, having told a London audience in 2003,
on the eve of the Iraq war, "Just so you know, we're ashamed the
President of the United States is from Texas," Maines has one regret:
the apology she offered George W. Bush at the onset of her infamy.

"I apologized for disrespecting the office of the president," says
Maines.

"But I don't feel that way anymore. I don't feel he is owed any
respect whatsoever."

A sizable chunk of their once adoring audience feels the same way
about the Dixie Chicks.

After Maines' pronouncement, which was vigorously seconded by
bandmates Martie Maguire and Emily Robison, the group received death
threats and was banned by thousands of country radio stations, many of
which still have informal bans in place.

The Dixie Chicks have mass appeal -- you can't sell 10 million copies
of two of your three albums without engaging lots of different people
-- but country radio is an indispensable part of how they reach
people.

Programmers say that even now a heartfelt apology could help set
things right with listeners, but it's not happening.

"If people are going to ask me to apologize based on who I am," says
Maines, "I don't know what to do about that. I can't change who I am."

As proof, the first single from the Dixie Chicks' new album, "Taking
the Long Way" (out May 23), is called "Not Ready to Make Nice."

It is, as one country radio programmer says, "a four-minute f--- you
to the format and our listeners. I like the Chicks, and I won't play
it."

Few other stations are playing Not Ready to Make Nice, and while it
has done well on iTunes, it's quite possible that in singing about
their anger at people who were already livid with them and were once
their target audience, the Chicks have written their own ticket to the
pop-culture glue factory.

"I guess if we really cared, we wouldn't have released that single
first," says Maguire.

"That was just making people mad. But I don't think it was a mistake."

Whether the Dixie Chicks recover their sales luster or not, the choice
of single has turned their album release into a referendum.

"Taking the Long Way" is designed to thumb its nose at country's
intolerance for ideological hell raising, and buying it or cursing it
reveals something about you and your politics -- or at least your
ability to put a grudge above your listening pleasure.

And however you vote, it's tough to deny that by gambling their
careers, three Texas women have the biggest balls in American music.

Over lunch in decidedly uncountry Santa Monica, California, where they
have lived part time while recording "Long Way," the Dixie Chicks --
in fancy jeans, tank tops and designer sunglasses -- seem less like
provocateurs than busy moms (they have seven kids in all, ages 1 to 5)
amped up by a little free time.

In conversation they are loud and unembarrassable, celebrating their
lack of boundaries in that escalating, I-can-be-more-blunt-than-you
way unique to sisters (which Maguire and Robison are) and women who
have shared a tour-bus bathroom.

They eagerly discuss the soullessness of Tom Cruise, the creepiness of
Charlie Sheen and the price-fixing practices of hair colorists.

But sex is the perennial champ, and they are in a constant state of
speculation about which of their kids' nannies is most likely to "get
some" on tour this summer.

"We're all married," says Maguire, "so it's not like we're going to."

______________________________________________________

Harry

From CNN, 5/21/06:
http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/05/21/cover.story.tm/index.html

Dixie Chicks in the line of fire

Editor's note: The following is a summary of this week's Time magazine
cover story.

(Time.com) --

Natalie Maines is one of those people born middle finger first.

As a high school senior in Lubbock, Texas, she'd skip a class a day in
an attempt to prove that because she never got caught and some Mexican
students did, the system was racist.

After Maines joined the Dixie Chicks, and the Dixie Chicks became the
biggest-selling female group in music history -- with suspiciously
little cash to show for it -- she and her bandmates told their record
label, Sony, they were declaring themselves free agents.

(In the high school that is Nashville, this is way worse than skipping
class.)

Now that she's truly notorious, having told a London audience in 2003,
on the eve of the Iraq war, "Just so you know, we're ashamed the
President of the United States is from Texas," Maines has one regret:
the apology she offered George W. Bush at the onset of her infamy.

"I apologized for disrespecting the office of the president," says
Maines.

"But I don't feel that way anymore. I don't feel he is owed any
respect whatsoever."

A sizable chunk of their once adoring audience feels the same way
about the Dixie Chicks.

After Maines' pronouncement, which was vigorously seconded by
bandmates Martie Maguire and Emily Robison, the group received death
threats and was banned by thousands of country radio stations, many of
which still have informal bans in place.

The Dixie Chicks have mass appeal -- you can't sell 10 million copies
of two of your three albums without engaging lots of different people
-- but country radio is an indispensable part of how they reach
people.

Programmers say that even now a heartfelt apology could help set
things right with listeners, but it's not happening.

"If people are going to ask me to apologize based on who I am," says
Maines, "I don't know what to do about that. I can't change who I am."

As proof, the first single from the Dixie Chicks' new album, "Taking
the Long Way" (out May 23), is called "Not Ready to Make Nice."

It is, as one country radio programmer says, "a four-minute f--- you
to the format and our listeners. I like the Chicks, and I won't play
it."

Few other stations are playing Not Ready to Make Nice, and while it
has done well on iTunes, it's quite possible that in singing about
their anger at people who were already livid with them and were once
their target audience, the Chicks have written their own ticket to the
pop-culture glue factory.

"I guess if we really cared, we wouldn't have released that single
first," says Maguire.

"That was just making people mad. But I don't think it was a mistake."

Whether the Dixie Chicks recover their sales luster or not, the choice
of single has turned their album release into a referendum.

"Taking the Long Way" is designed to thumb its nose at country's
intolerance for ideological hell raising, and buying it or cursing it
reveals something about you and your politics -- or at least your
ability to put a grudge above your listening pleasure.

And however you vote, it's tough to deny that by gambling their
careers, three Texas women have the biggest balls in American music.

Over lunch in decidedly uncountry Santa Monica, California, where they
have lived part time while recording "Long Way," the Dixie Chicks --
in fancy jeans, tank tops and designer sunglasses -- seem less like
provocateurs than busy moms (they have seven kids in all, ages 1 to 5)
amped up by a little free time.

In conversation they are loud and unembarrassable, celebrating their
lack of boundaries in that escalating, I-can-be-more-blunt-than-you
way unique to sisters (which Maguire and Robison are) and women who
have shared a tour-bus bathroom.

They eagerly discuss the soullessness of Tom Cruise, the creepiness of
Charlie Sheen and the price-fixing practices of hair colorists.

But sex is the perennial champ, and they are in a constant state of
speculation about which of their kids' nannies is most likely to "get
some" on tour this summer.

"We're all married," says Maguire, "so it's not like we're going to."

______________________________________________________

Harry