Dissin' the Chicks

A choice bit of hagiography from the Telegraph:

Telegraph Entertainment How the Chicks survived their scrap with Bush

I thought their "scrap" was more with country music fans than the prez himself, but I digress. Here are some snippets (with inevitable commentary by yours truly):

Will it be the salmon teriyaki with organic greens, or asparagus tempura and tuna sashimi? As the waiter hovers with pencil poised, the Dixie Chicks debate the menu with the practised air of professional restaurant critics. The Chicks have traditionally been branded a country band, but clearly it's some time since their diet consisted of ribs, tacos and pancakes.

Oh, puke. Here we go again. Once again, the Eurosnobs show their ignorance. "The only thing country music fans (read: Red Staters) eat are chitlins, grits and pork rinds." Give me a break.

Sisters Emily Robison and Martie Maguire project a polished Fifth Avenue elegance, and vocalist Natalie Maines is a vision of sculpted cheekbones and smoky eye-shadow.

And looks like a punk Leprechaun in the photo accompanying the article. And I've never seen her with a decent hairdo.

Yet within days [of Maines' comment in London about George Bush], their music vanished from the charts and the airwaves, apoplectic rednecks crushed piles of their CDs with tractors, and the FBI was feverishly monitoring death threats against the trio.

Now, death threats are beyond the pale, but notice the "rednecks" comment! All you guys who found Maines' comments insulting and made a little theater out of it are rednecks! Oh, the horror of being called a redneck by the Telegraph. I might have to go lie down.

"It was the bullying and the scare factor," shudders banjo and guitar player Robison. "It was like the McCarthy days, and it was almost like the country was unrecognisable."

Excuse me while I wipe coffee off the computer monitor. Yeah, right. You guys were hauled in front of Congress, it got so bad. (BTW, McCarthy was right about Communists infiltrating the government, according to declassified Soviet cables, but that's for another post.)

"A lot of pandering started going on, and you'd see soldiers and the American flag in every video [by other country performers]. It became a sickening display of ultra-patriotism."

And you weren't pandering to the London crowd by slamming your own country in front of a foreign audience?

"The entire country may disagree with me, but I don't understand the necessity for patriotism," Maines resumes, through gritted teeth. "Why do you have to be a patriot? About what? This land is our land? Why? You can like where you live and like your life, but as for loving the whole country… I don't see why people care about patriotism."

This is precisely why you couldn't predict that your slamming the president before a foreign audience would ignite such a brushfire back home. And you apparently still cannot put 2 and 2 together, which perhaps explains why you wore that hideous plaid skirt and Leprechaun tights onstage.

There can be no rational explanation of how Maines's remark came to drive a red-hot poker into America's divided soul ...

The Telegraph is equally clueless.

Early concerns about the premature demise of the Chicks' career subsided when the furiously unapologetic single Not Ready to Make Nice became the most downloaded track on iTunes, despite a lack of radio airplay.

No mention of their canceling concert dates left and right. :)