They're Still Not Ready To Play Nice, Bitches!

5 Grammys, people!  That's right, the music industry served notice to the asshats who boycotted, threatened and insulted The Dixie Chicks with a big STFU!  The controversy erupted during the run-up to the illegal Iraq war when singer, Nathalie Maines said "Just so you know, we're ashamed that the President of the United States is from Texas." at a concert in London. That's it. After that they received death threats, demands that they "shut up and sing", their songs were banned from many country radio stations, there were "Dixie Chick CD Destruction Parties". Fuck, I'm ashamed and embarrassed and disgusted that the Shrub is American, let alone from Texas. Anyway, the Chicks fought back with statements like this (the statement is near the end of the article) and publicity like this. And then in March 2006 they released "Not Ready to Make Nice", an unapologetic, in your face smackdown. 

I'm proud of my girls. I'm not a country music fan but I'd read the reviews before all this happened and knew that the Chicks were more than a country act, like Johnny Cash, they could transcend the genre (that's right, I just invoked Johnny Cash as a mentor or precursor to the Dixie Chicks, deal with it) but I never really made the leap (Goodbye Earl, notwithstanding) until this latest album (produced by Rick Rubin of Johnny Cash's "American Recordings" series...hmmm). Now I'm a fan, "Not Ready to Make Nice", is a great, defiant song:

It’s a sad sad story when a mother will teach her daughter that she ought to hate a perfect stranger
And how in the world can the words that I said
Send somebody so over the edge
That they’d write me a letter sayin’ that I better shut up and sing or my life will be over.

I plan to see Shut Up and Sing as soon as possible.

{Fuckity, fuck, fuck, I shit you not, as I'm writing this up, iTunes, on random, with 1851 songs, plays "Bitter End" off Taking the Long Way followed by the Johnny Cash's "Personal Jesus" cover off American IV: The Man Comes Around. Spooky.}

[Ed. Note: Just so no one gets offended or bent out of shape, the "bitches" in the subject of this post and the "...bitches" tag are in reference to possibly my favorite Cute Overload post, Paws Up, Bitches! When I saw this one I knew I was hooked.]