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Dixie Chicks have fun with Rob Ford scandal in Oshawa
Band delights fans at sold-out concert
By Mike Ruta
Long time indeed.
Dixie Chicks, on their first full-length tour in six years, the Long Time Gone tour, played a sold-out show
at Oshawa’s General Motors Centre on Nov. 8.
And cheeky lead singer Natalie Maines took the opportunity to land a few playful jabs at embattled Toronto
Mayor Rob Ford.
"We know you guys like to make a lot of fun of America, think you’re better," she teased. "But now you’ve
got Mayor Rob Ford."
A few songs later she took up the subject again, suggesting that the mayor still had a lot of questions to
answer.
"He wants us all to see that he did crack because he was wasted? That explains it."
"We’re going to dedicate this song to Mayor Ford."
The band launched into the frenetic Sin Wagon.
In a nearly two-hour show, the Texas trio, Maines and sisters Martie Erwin Maguire and Emily Erwin Robison,
took the crowd on a linear journey through their song catalogue, from the first album to the most recent. The well-paced show
mixed ballads such as You Were Mine and Landslide with up-tempo songs and favourites like Goodbye Earl and Long Time Gone,
the band showing what fans have been missing since they’ve been away taking a break and doing solo projects: first and
foremost, Maines’s wonderful, powerful voice; well-crafted songs with fine harmonies and musicianship; but, most of
all, the ability of this band to comfortably straddle the line between country/bluegrass and pop. Many groups today, so-so
pop or rock bands, really, have associated themselves with the ever-popular new country genre, wearing cowboy hats and the
like. But Dixie Chicks, whose roots are in traditional bluegrass and country music, more than any band have been able to seamlessly
merge genres.
Two people who got a kick out of the Mayor Ford references were Dale Yurka and Andrew Palmer of Toronto.
"It was fantastic," Yurka said of the show.
Her highlight was the second song in the encore, Not Ready to Make Nice.
"Some people are good entertainers, some are good musicians; they’re both," Palmer said.
"It’s a band that’s comfortable; they know they’re good."
Maines, known for making controversial statements, most notably about former U.S. president George W. Bush,
is sporting a mohawk haircut these days, giving her a far edgier look. Two songs into the show she said to the crowd, "you
look fantastic; I love what you did with your hair."
Later, she noted her son "has a tendency to say whatever he thinks; I don’t know where he gets that
from."
When he came home from school one day and saw his mom’s haircut for the first time, Maines said he didn’t
mince words.
"I haaaate it," Maines said was his uncensored reaction. "It’s hideous. You’re so ugly."
Dixie Chicks still refuse to just shut up and sing, to delight of fans
Christina Strynatka, Toronto Performing Arts Examiner
On Nov. 8, 2013, the Dixie Chicks swung by Oshawa's GM Centre for the GTA stop of their Long Time Gone tour, and judging
by the reception, it was like the virtuosic trio had never left Canada.
I'm through with doubt
That's not to say the response was entirely warranted, at least for the first half, anyway. The multi-coloured lights were
ready to flash on the stage, designed to look like ten small scaffolds hugged the back of it, but no performers. After a bit
of a late start, lead singer Natalie Maines hardly spoke with the crowd and when she did, it was barely more than generic
platitudes. Although it's been 10 years since the George W. Bush incident, an event that was paid far more attention than
probably necessitated, it's hard to picture Maines as taking to heart the words she sings in "Not Ready to Make Nice". Could
this be a softer, more subdued side to her?
No.
There's nothing left for me to figure out
Her reticence lasted all of a handful of songs before she finally made a political comment, this time directed at Toronto's
ongoing scandal. "So," she remarked casually. "What were we talking about- Mayor Ford?" But the way the sold-out crowd reacted,
it was as though Maines had mentioned there'd be free ice cream after the show instead of making reference to the mayor of
the fourth-largest North American city admitting to drug use while in office. Cheekily, though, she dedicated the next song,
"Sin Wagon" to Ford, a hard-driving bluegrass tune that was accented by flashing lights and racing instrumentals. Maines's
voice is darn hard to play over, even when she dials it back, but Emily Robison and Martie Maguire beautifully blended their
respective instruments together to create the signature Dixie Chicks sound that's aged and matured over 23 years.
I've paid a price
Maines's sassiness didn't stop there, as she introduced "Godspeed (Sweet Dreams)", the kind of lullaby Brahms might have
written had be been Radney Foster in 1999, by regaling the story of how one of her sons felt strongly about her new mohawk
haircut. "My youngest, Beckett, is nine and he has a tendency to say what's on his mind. I wonder where he got that from?"
she mused.
As the night progressed, with the Dixie Chicks moving in chronological order on their songs, it was at about the three-quarter
mark that they came to songs from Taking the Long Way. And though it's been seven years since the release of that album and
10 since "The Incident", Maines's face was screwed up during "The Long Way Around" like the scars hadn't healed and memories
were still bubbling under the surface.
And I'll keep paying it
But one of the most appealing things about the Dixie Chicks is their united front and endurance. The trio of Maines, Maguire
and Robison is like a much-envied marriage, a partnership where each may not like or agree with what the others are doing,
but still stand by with love and support. However, with no new record containing original songs having been released since
Taking the Long Way, fans are remarkably patient and welcoming in spite of that. In an interview earlier this year with the
National Post, Robison and Maguire were on record as saying, "It’d be so much easier if we just broke up and when we
decided to do something to just get back together" and "it probably would be easier and it wouldn’t string the fans
along quite so [much]."
It turned my whole world around and I kinda like it
For now, the Dixie Chicks are still together, even if the members are pursuing their own projects as well. And for Canadians,
citizens of the country that welcomed them with open arms in 2003, this is very good news indeed.
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