… and I understand where they are coming from. I find it easier to forgive – and more difficult to forget…
The Dixie Chicks – like the Phoenix – have risen again – thankfully…
See what the Dixie Chicks are up to now…
Forgive, sounds good.
Forget, I’m not sure I could.
They say time heals everything,
But I’m still waiting
I’m through, with doubt,
There’s nothing left for me to figure out,
I’ve paid a price, and i’ll keep paying
I’m not ready to make nice,
I’m not ready to back down,
I’m still mad as hell
And I don’t have time
To go round and round and round
It’s too late to make it right
I probably wouldn’t if I could
Cause I’m mad as hell
Can’t bring myself to do what it is
You think I should
I know you said
Why can’t you just get over it,
It turned my whole world around
and i kind of like it
I made by bed, and I sleep like a baby,
With no regrets and I don’t mind saying,
It’s a sad sad story
That a mother will teach her daughter
that she ought to hate a perfect stranger.
And how in the world
Can the words that I said
Send somebody so over the edge
That they’d write me a letter
Saying that I better shut up and sing
Or my life will be over
I’m not ready to make nice,
I’m not ready to back down,
I’m still mad as hell
And I don’t have time
To go round and round and round
It’s too late to make it right
I probably wouldn’t if I could
Cause I’m mad as hell
Can’t bring myself to do what it is
You think I should
I’m not ready to make nice,
I’m not ready to back down,
I’m still mad as hell
And I don’t have time
To go round and round and round
It’s too late to make it right
I probably wouldn’t if I could
Cause I’m mad as hell
Can’t bring myself to do what it is
You think I should
Forgive, sounds good.
Forget, I’m not sure I could.
They say time heals everything,
But I’m still waiting
____________________________________________________________________________________________________
Dixie Chicks beat backlash, hit No. 1 with new album
Last Updated Thu, 01 Jun 2006 10:36:22 EDT
CBC Arts
The Dixie Chicks have debuted at the top of country and pop music charts in the U.S. with a new album, three years since they were vilified for publicly criticizing the U.S. president.
‘I don’t have any respect for the decisions he’s made and where he has led our country,’ Natalie Maines, lead singer of the Dixie Chicks, said about U.S. President George W. Bush. (Frank Franklin II/AP)
Taking the Long Way, released last week, is the pop-country trio’s first album since 2003, when lead singer Natalie Maines told a London concert she was ashamed U.S. President George W. Bush was a fellow Texan. Country radio responded by boycotting their music, the trio received death threats and their property was vandalized.
After a few years of lying low, however, the band’s new album took the top spot on Billboard’s country albums chart and the Billboard 200 overall chart on Wednesday after its first week of release. Both charts are based on sales rather than radio play.
Some in the country music establishment continue to oppose the group, including some radio programmers who have not added the new album to their playlists. However, in an interview on CNN Wednesday night, Maines says she maintains her stance against Bush.
“I don’t have any respect for the decisions he’s made and where he has led our country,” Maines said.
New liberal-minded fans for the Chicks?
There could be many reasons for the strong sales, Wade Jessen, director of Billboard’s country charts, told the Associated Press.
Jessen said that perhaps the group was attracting a broader audience or that country fans were simply not as bothered by the anti-Bush comments as many originally thought.
“There also might be a certain amount of support that may have been thrown their way by folks who are a little more liberal and that maybe never bought a country album in their lives but want to show their support,” he added.
It could also be that Taking the Long Way, which includes a song titled Not Ready to Make Nice, is now more indicative of how Americans are feeling about their president, with recent polls showing that more people are voicing criticism about his leadership.
“Why are we still killing?” Helen Thomas, long-time dean of the White House Press Corps., recalled asking at a White House briefing this week.
“[White House Press Secretary] Tony Snow said, ‘We’re at war.’ And I want to say ‘With whom?’” she told CBC News.
Number 1 but still no ‘Home’
Though Taking the Long Way sold 525,000 copies last week, enough to make it number 1, the sales figure is much lower than the previous Dixie Chicks studio album, 2002′s Home, which sold 780,000 copies during its first week.
The band’s albums also include its 1998 debut Wide Open Spaces and 1999′s Fly.
Some believe that the Dixie Chicks are moving away from a country music base, especially since the band enlisted rock producer Rick Rubin to work on the new album.
Rubin is best known for his work with hip hop, heavy metal and rock musicians, including the Beastie Boys, Run-D.M.C., Slayer and the Red Hot Chili Peppers. He also founded American Records and produced the final, acclaimed crossover albums by Johnny Cash.
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Defiant Dixie Chicks blast Bush in new album
Last Updated Sun, 21 May 2006 16:52:45 EDT
CBC Arts
The Dixie Chicks’ Natalie Maines is ready to take on President George W. Bush and his supporters again.
Dixie Chicks’ Natalie Maines, seen in 2003 in New York, is still ‘not ready to make nice’ with Bush supporters. (Frank Franklin II/Associated Press)
In a Time magazine article to appear Monday, she says she’s taking back the apology she made after saying in 2003 that she’s ashamed the president comes from Texas.
The original remark, made at a London concert just before the Iraq invasion, drew an immediate outcry from fans and commentators. Dixie Chicks album sales plummeted and many radio hosts refused to play their music. They even got death threats.
Maines was forced to deliver an apology in which she said: “As a concerned American citizen, I apologize to President Bush because my remark was disrespectful. I feel that whoever holds that office should be treated with the utmost respect.”
But in an article titled Time 100: The People that Shape Our World, she says she’s changed her mind.
“I don’t feel that way anymore,” she said. “I don’t feel he is owed any respect whatsoever.”
Maines joins a growing chorus of artists such as Neil Young in taking a stance against the Iraq war.
Time calls the Dixie Chicks “Defiant Darlings,” saying “They’ll sing, but they won’t shut up.”
Their newest recording, Taking the Long Way, contains an answer for their many critics, with the line “wouldn’t kiss all the ass that they told me to.” One of the tunes, Not Ready to Make Nice, has the Chicks singing, “I’m still mad as hell.”
For band member Martie Maguire, the controversy over Maines’ remark was a blessing in disguise.
“I’d rather have a small following of really cool people who get it, who will grow with us as we grow and are fans for life, than people that have us in their five-disc changer with Reba McEntire and Toby Keith,” Maguire said.
A high-profile spat with Keith and with some very conservative country music fans followed the incident.
“We don’t want those kinds of fans. They limit what you can do,” said Maguire, who shares the stage with Maines and Emily Robinson.
