The Chicks struck all the right chords for fans at St. Joe’s Amp in Syracuse

By Sunny Hernandez, Syracuse.com

Syracuse, N.Y. — On a pleasant summer evening, upwards of 15,000 fans poured into the St. Joseph’s Health Amphitheater to hear the (now Dixie-less) Chicks serenade Syracuse fans for the very first time on Wednesday, June 29.

Women of all ages made up the majority of the audience, though a smattering of husbands and boyfriends could also be found in attendance. The sea of concert attire was made up of everything from colorful (and light-up) cowboy hats, cowboy boots, flannel, and plenty of fringe, to rainbow flags and Planned Parenthood t-shirts.

Folk artist Patty Griffin kicked off the night with country storytelling that had a bluegrass flair. She also told the Central New York crowd about her confusion on how to pronounce "Onondaga."

"It sounds like ‘on a doggy’," she mused.

While the crew changed sets for the headlining act, video screens amped up the crowd with a music video playlist of some of the biggest women in rock from the 70s and 80s. As artists like Tina Turner, Heart, Blondie, and Joan Jett played across the monitors, fans cheered and sang along to the hits.

The compilation ended with Joan Jett’s "Bad Reputation" which stopped abruptly as the curtain fell to reveal the Grammy-winning country trio. It’s the first time Martie Maguire, Natalie Maines and Emily Strayer have reunited for a tour in five years and Wednesday was the only Upstate New York stop.

Immediately the band whipped the crowd into a frenzy with their 1999 hit, "Sin Wagon." Pushing a fast paced beat and a frenzy of lights and vintage video clips, The Chicks immediately captured everyone’s attention.

From "Sin Wagon," the group played the titular track from their latest album "Gaslighter," which was released in 2020. This tour marks the first time they have been able to play it in a live concert setting. The night’s 23-song setlist was a mix of fan favorites and new songs, leaning heavily on "Gaslighter."

After a few songs, vocalist Maines addressed the crowd, remarking that this was the band’s first time playing Syracuse and that they even had a day off in town.

"We got to see where all the drug deals go down — on accident," she said. "But, we got to see a lot of beautiful things too."

In the setup for an onstage game of dice, video clips teased several of their signature songs. A list of six tracks were shown on the screen while a young girl named Violet walked out on stage. She rolled a giant fuzzy dice cube, which landed on the number three, determining the band would play "Ready to Run," and the crowd roared with excitement.

For the rest of the evening songs of scorn, fury, and freedom played on in tunes like "Sleep At Night," "Flip Flop Fly," and "Not Ready to Make Nice."

The band volleyed between stage wide performances with complex graphics and lighting design to a more pared down and intimate setting with the entire ensemble coming towards the front of the stage.

The Chicks have never shied away from politics and this concert was no different.

Many of the images played throughout the night carried political undertones, picturing women marching for suffrage, riding in tanks, carrying signs for women’s reproductive rights, Black Lives Matter, and more.

During "Tights On My Boat," with the lyric "You’re gonna get what you got coming to ya," crowds cheered as an animation of a boat with images of the Supreme Court justices who voted for Roe V. Wade to be overturned floated across the screen before exploding and sinking.

At another point, the stage screens cycled through city names where mass shootings took place and the number of people who died. This included the recent shootings in Buffalo and the 2009 Binghamton mass shooting at the American Civic Association.

The list of cities kicked off the song "March, March," and transitioned into a "Say Their Names" memorial paying homage to people like Breonna Taylor, Trayvon Martin, Ahmaud Arbery and many more. The song ended with an image of a woman holding a protest sign that read, "My body, my choice."

Other highlights of the night included Maines introducing her 21-year-old son Slade as one of the guitar players in the band and opener Patty Griffin joined the group to sing her song "Please Don’t Let Me Die in Florida."

Throughout the night women pumped their fists in excitement and went wild each and every time Maguire had a fiddle solo. They sang along to setlist hits like "Cowboy Take Me Away," "Wide Open Spaces," and The Chicks popular cover of "Landslide."

As the evening wound down, the band played back-to-back ballads "Everybody Loves You" and "Young Man."

Their finale brought one last blast of energy, causing fans to jump up and down while singing the refrains of their 1999 hit, "Goodbye, Earl."

Maines bid farewell to Syracuse with the hope to return soon and the audience was played out to Olivia Newton John’s "Xanadu."

The Chicks were the fourth concert of this year’s season at the St. Joe’s Amp.

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