Dixie Chicks may have enjoyed a Grammy triumph this week, but a huge section of US society will never forgive them for speaking out against George Bush in London four years ago, writes Shane Hegarty
The remark came during a concert in London on March 10th, 2003. Dixie Chicks were about to perform Travelin' Soldier, a song about a heartsick Vietnam GI, when lead singer Natalie Maines took a notion to share something with the audience. The Texan leant into the microphone and quipped: "Just so you know, we're ashamed that the president of the United States is from Texas." The crowd cheered. They mightn't have known that war in Iraq was precisely 10 days away, but they knew it was imminent, and they were fresh from a massive anti-war demonstration. Maines, then, was quipping to the converted. But another of the band members, Emily Robison, felt a charge run through her body. "I got hot from my head to my toes," she later said. "Just kind of this rush of 'Oh s***.' It wasn't that I didn't agree with her 100 per cent; it was just, 'Oh, this is going to stir something up'."
Stirred up? It exploded - and to a proportion both absurd and comical to many living outside the US. Their winning of five awards at this week's Grammys included them becoming the first act to win best record, album and single in 14 years. But it doesn't represent a triumphal return, because the row continues to represent country music's proud and undying patriotism, the easily triggered sensitivities that divide the US, that country's distorted notions of free speech, the cultural gulf between red and blue states, and the power of the broadcasting monoliths. But most of all, it came to represent just how retarded political debate is within certain strata of American culture.
The original storm broke when the Guardian reported the remark in its review of the show. Within a couple of days it was on American evening news. Within the week, Dixie Chicks had been boycotted by country music stations across the US. A Missouri radio station put a bin outside its door for people to throw their Dixie Chicks CDs into. Another, in Louisiana, organised for a 33,000lb tractor to crush a large pile of the band's albums and merchandise.
The group - Maines, Robison and her sister Martie Maguire - received death threats, at least one of them considered credible by the FBI. They required around-the-clock security and, because a newspaper printed her home address in Austin, Texas, Maines had to move house.
They went on national television, where the grand dame of current affairs, Diane Sawyer, opened her interview by asking: "Ashamed? Do you feel awful about using that word about the president of the United States?" And Maines did indeed apologise for being so disrespectful, bowing to that peculiar American belief that the office of president is beyond criticism, even if that means confusing it with the office holder. It did nothing to take the heat out of things. Right-wing websites were enjoying this too much. That the band members are all female gave particular scope for abuse. "Bruce Springsteen occasionally gets flack for his political remarks," observed one commentator, "but he doesn't get called a slut." And Travelin' Soldier? It had been number one in the country music charts at the start of that week. By the next, it was number 63.
BEAR IN MIND that Dixie Chicks had sung Star-Spangled Banner at the Superbowl only two months previously. Their previous two albums had sold 10 million copies each, and the album they were touring had already notched up six million sales. By 2003, they were still a country act, but had developed their sound enough to have earned their first top 10 hit in the US pop singles chart. They had also already developed a reputation as being somewhat punkish - in so far as country music can ever be punkish. They didn't act like singing housewives or settle for bland lyrics. And they had hinted that their politics might have a pinkish hue by openly identifying with the sensibilities of Bruce Springsteen.
Yet, they were still huge in country music's heartland, which also happens to be the Republican Party's base, and were probably on their way to becoming country music royalty. Until Maines took a look at the London audience and thought: "Everyone in Europe, or everyone outside of the US, talked about the US like we all thought one way. So it was important for me to let them know that you can't group us all into one." This was a time when plenty of singers and actors were going out of their way to criticise the administration, but they were considered the usual east and west coast bleeding heart liberals. Flag burners and Osama apologists. Unpatriotic and imbecilic. But to hear this from Dixie Chicks was a whole other matter. Suddenly, the enemy was within.
Country music singer Toby Keith proved particularly willing to take on the challenge of coming up with imaginative slurs. He had become best known for his post-9/11 song Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue (The Angry American), with it's tub-thumping message of "you'll be sorry that you messed with the US of A, 'cause we'll put a boot in your ass, it's the American way".
In 2002, Maines had gone on record to say that the song was "ignorant, and it makes country music sound ignorant". After her comment about Bush, Keith went on stage to the backdrop of a mocked-up photograph of Maines with Saddam Hussein.
Of greater impact to Dixie Chicks was the fact that they were now up against the sensitivities of the country radio stations, who appeared to be not only attuned to the whims of their listeners but also to the political needs of their management. By that stage the communications giant Clear Channel Communications, for instance, already controlled 1,200 radio stations, and it was later pointed out that most of the pro-war Rallies for America, at which the Dixie Chicks became a focus of anger, were organised by its stations. Clear Channel's vice-chairman was Tom Hicks, a man with numerous ties to the Bush family, which included purchasing the Texas Rangers in 1998 in a deal that made George W Bush a multi-millionaire.
Initially shocked at the level of outrage they had "stirred up", Dixie Chicks hit back with a publicity campaign that included a cover of Entertainment Weekly in which they posed naked except for some of the labels flung at them during the controversy - including "Hero", "Dixie Sluts" and "Saddam's Angels". This was May, almost two months after the original comment, but things were still sensitive enough for two DJs to be suspended by a Colorado station for playing Dixie Chicks records.
Later that month, the band were booed when their nomination for Entertainer of the Year was announced at the Academy of Country Music awards. Toby Keith won the award.
It took three years for them to make another album, last year's Taking The Long Way, which largely skirted around the controversy except for the headline-grabbing single Not Ready To Make Nice. It was an unapologetic blast at their critics, and it was a rarity on country music channels.
COUNTRY MUSIC TELEVISION has conducted several focus groups on Dixie Chicks. "They're all a great study in the American psyche," the channel's executive vice-president told Time magazine. "What comes up over and over again is, 'It would have been one thing if they'd said it on American soil, but it's the fact that they said it in Europe that really sets me off!'" This week's Grammy win was seen as yet another small battle in the culture war, with the broader industry lauding the group only a few months after the Country Music Awards ignored them completely. Jeff Ayeroff, who is behind the non-partisan movement Rock the Vote, told the New York Times that a man sitting behind him in the Grammy audience sniggered each time Dixie Chicks won an award. "Finally, I got so disgusted, I turned around and said: 'Dude, you're in California now. Even our Republicans are Democrats'." The album has sold 1.9 million copies, which might be a decent return for most bands but is well down on their previous successes. They hardly feature on country music radio now and have become used to playing smaller venues. A documentary released last year that chronicles the band's recent history, Shut Up And Sing, features a scene in which ticket sales are being tracked by computer as soon as they go on sale. It's immediately obvious that they are not selling well in the south, so the itinerary is changed to take the group across Canada.
"I think I'd gotten too comfortable living my life," Natalie Maines said last year. "I didn't know people thought about us a certain way - that we were Republican and pro-war." And the only thing she's sorry for is her apology. "I apologised for disrespecting the office of the president, but I don't feel that way any more. I don't feel he is owed any respect whatsoever."
TheDixieChicksFile
Who are they?
Texan country rock act comprising Natalie Maines, Martie Maguire and her sister, Emily Robison.
Why are they in the news?
They won five Grammy awards this week, almost four years after their criticism of George W Bush led to boycotts, death threats and plummeting sales.
Most appealing characteristic?
For a country act, they've never allowed themselves to be bracketed as down-home cowgirls.
Least appealing characteristic?
In this part of the world, at least, they are known more for the political row than their music.
Most likely to say?
What's on their minds.
Least likely to say?
"We're just girls. We wouldn't know anything about politics."