On a March evening in a London theatre, the American singer Natalie Maines stood on stage with her country group the Dixie Chicks and introduced a song about a soldier. Before the music started, she told the crowd that the band did not support the coming invasion of Iraq and felt ashamed that President George W. Bush came from Texas. It was a few sentences, spoken between songs, and it set off one of the fiercest backlashes in modern country music. Natalie Maines was born on October 14, 1974.
It was a few sentences, spoken between songs, and it set off one of the fiercest backlashes in modern country music.
From Lubbock to the Dixie Chicks
Maines was born in Lubbock, Texas, in 1974, and grew up around music: her father was a musician and producer. She became the lead vocalist of the Dixie Chicks in 1995, stepping in for founding singer Laura Lynch. With Maines out front, the group collected 13 Grammy awards for work stretching from 1998 to 2007, and became one of the most successful female acts in country music.
The London comment changed everything. Thousands of country radio stations in the United States blacklisted the group, and the band members received death threats. Maines apologised at first, but by 2006 she had taken the apology back, saying Bush did not deserve respect. The fury did not fade quietly; it followed the band from radio playlists to concert security briefings.
Writing Taking the Long Way
Maines turned that pressure into songs. She was the main writer on all 14 tracks of the 2006 album Taking the Long Way, which reached the top of the Billboard 200 chart. The single 'Not Ready to Make Nice' climbed to number 4 on the Billboard Hot 100 and won the Grammy for song of the year. Maines has called the writing process 'pure therapy' after the scandal.
The industry noticed the shift. In 2007 the Dixie Chicks won all five Grammys they were nominated for, including album of the year for Taking the Long Way. That same year, Maines received a VH1 award for the 'Big Quote of '03', a nod to how one sentence had defined a cultural moment. The group had gone from radio blacklist to the biggest night in music.
The feud with Toby Keith
The fight was not only with radio and fans. Maines had a public feud with the country singer Toby Keith over his song 'Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue'. She called the song ignorant and harmful to country music's reputation. Keith hit back, belittling her songwriting and saying he would 'bury her'. During his 2003 tour, a backdrop showed an altered photo of Maines with Saddam Hussein.
Maines answered with a T-shirt. At the Academy of Country Music Awards that May, she wore one with the letters 'F.U.T.K.' The band's website claimed the letters stood for 'Freedom, United, Together in Kindness', but the 2006 documentary Shut Up and Sing confirmed the letters were an expletive aimed at Toby Keith. It was a small act of defiance.
By the time Taking the Long Way arrived, Maines had turned a career-threatening scandal into the group's most personal record. The album did not just survive the backlash; it won the industry's top honours and gave the Dixie Chicks a new audience beyond country radio. Natalie Maines, the singer from Lubbock who once told a second-grade teacher she did not need maths because she would be a star, had proved the point in the most difficult way possible.