Las Vegas, NV 2023

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Chicks in Las Vegas 2023

The Chicks Break Through With Memorable Strip Show

by John Katsilometes, Las Vegas Review-Journal
 

We expected The Chicks do their own thing in their debut at Planet Hollywood. They did not disappoint.

 

The superstar trio held the stage for 2 hours and 20 minutes. In a Strip hotel-casino. On a weeknight. Crazy! Who do they think they are?

 

We joke of course. But maybe Natalie Maines, Martie Maguire and Emily Strayer are altering the trajectory with these headlining residency shows. Take your time to make your statement, right? Over the years these have been are clipped at about 90 minutes, so hotel guests can wade back to the casino and enjoy a different form of entertainment.

 

Likely, The Chicks simply don’t care about such provisions. But Maines did joke that she’d hit a massive jackpot earlier in the day. “Maybe you saw it on TMZ,” she said. Some of us searched our phones, finding no evidence of this alleged windfall.

 

The extended showtime was fine with The Chicks’ devotees who ventured to Bakkt Theater, recently renamed but still set up as a party zone. Fans in the standing GA section always create a festival atmosphere.

 

The Chicks were energized and engaged while knocking out such favorites as “Ready to Run,” “Cowboy Take Me Away,” “Goodbye Earl” and 10 selections from their most recent release, “Gaslighter.”

 

Ever defiant, The Chicks brought their sharpened worldview to the dance. The band made it clear it is pro-choice, pro-LGBTQ, pro-Ukraine, pro-civil rights. “March March” enforced The Chicks’ gun-control advocacy, school safety, ending with images of women protesting and holding up such signs as, “Keep Your Laws Off Our Bodies.”

 

 Maines’ wicked run through “Tights On My Boat” (which fans interpret as an account of the events leading to the singer’s divorce) played with a graphic of Vladimir Putin riding the waves on a rainbow-horned unicorn.

 

The acerbic articulation was widespread. The Chicks performed Patty Griffin’s “Don’t Let Me Die in Florida,” an unambiguous take-down of the Sunshine State. A sample, from the stage, “I don’t care about my name/If you catch me dying in Daytona/Roll my bed onto a train.”

 

As she finished, Maines smiled and said, “If anyone here is from Florida, we love y’all.”

 

The Chicks later summoned the Miley Cyrus-Dolly Parton collab “Rainbowland,” which in March was banned by an elementary school in Wisconsin because some parents said it encourages LGBTQ acceptance, while referencing rainbows. Cyrus and Parton’s spoken banter at the top led into the number.

 

Midway through the set, The Chicks’ nine-piece band, which featured Maines’ son, Slade, on guitar, broke it down for an eight-song acoustic set. This was some confident musical craftsmanship.

 

Vocally, Maines was flawless. She has done her homework about how the desert air can damage a singer’s voice, her microphone equipped with a what seems steaming device as a humidifier (Maines missed three shows two years ago for vocal problems). The mist rising actually created its own mystic stage effect.

 

“Not Ready To Make Nice,” the James Taylor cover of “That Lonesome Road” and “Goodbye Earl” sent the fans away happy. Well, most of them.

 

A concert-goer waiting at valet said the show was musically great but “too political.” Maybe, or maybe it wasn’t political enough. Depends on your side of the aisle. But always, The Chicks are going to be who they are. You can set your watch to it.

 

Setlist

Gaslighter

Sin Wagon

Texas Man

Julianna Calm Down

The Long Way Around

My Best Friend’s Weddings

Sleep at Night

Ready to Run

Top of the World

Wide Open Spaces

Tights on My Boat

Daddy Lessons/ Long Time Gone

Lubbock or Leave It

Cowboy Take Me Away

Rainbowland

Don't Let Me Die in Florida

Landslide

March March

For Her

White Trash Wedding

Everybody Loves You

Set Me Free

Not Ready to Make Nice

 

Encore:

That Lonesome Road

Goodbye Earl

    Please take note of this before emailing me. I have no affiliation with The Chicks and/or their website, Court Yard Hounds and/or their website, Natalie Maines Music and/or her website, their management, publicists, record label or anyone else they may come in contact with on a regular basis. This is just a fan owned site. I do not have an email address for them. Your message cannot be passed on to them.
 
 
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