In 2006, with Maines still acting as lead singer, the (Dixie) Chicks released Taking the Long Way. The album subsequently won five Grammy Awards (including Album of the Year). After dropping the "Dixie", the Chicks new album Gaslighter was released on July 17, 2020. As a solo artist, Maines released the album, Mother, on May 7, 2013.
Early life
Maines was born in Lubbock, Texas, to country musician and producer Lloyd Maines and Tina May Maines. She attended Nat Williams Elementary School in Lubbock, where her second grade teacher recalls being told by Maines during a math lesson, "Teacher, I don't need to learn this stuff—I'm gonna be a star."[1] Maines was a cheerleader while attending O. L. Slaton Junior High School,[1] and graduated in 1992 from Lubbock High School where she had participated in the school choir.[4] Maines has described growing up in conservative Texas, saying "I always rebelled against that. My parents sent me and my sister to public minority schools so I always felt like a hippie and a rebel. ... As a teenager I always loved not thinking in the way I knew the majority of people thought. I always stood up for minorities. ... I've always stood up for homosexuals. I just always had these really strong convictions about doing so."[5]
Following the completion of high school, Maines attended several colleges. She spent two semesters pursuing an undeclared major at West Texas A&M where her studies focused heavily on radio, then a year and a half at South Plains College. One of Maines's instructors at South Plains, and a former member of The Maines Brothers Band, Cary Banks, recalled "She was mostly into rock'n'roll, rhythm and blues ... alternative rock." When Banks encountered Maines on campus, he said that she usually needed to vent a little steam. "She would get into a lot of political arguments" at the predominantly Republican school, and was a fan of Texas Governor Ann Richards. "She's always been opinionated and hardheaded like her dad."[1] In December 1994, Maines auditioned for and received a full vocal scholarship to Berklee College of Music. She pursued the diploma program at Berklee but dropped out before the completion of her studies. Even though Maines is from Lubbock, home of Texas Tech University, she attended only one class at the school, a 1995 summer course in "Introductory Wildlife".[1]
Career
Maines's first professional recording was lead vocals on the song "White Women's Clothes" on Andy Wilkinson's album "Charlie Goodnight's Life in Poetry and Song." Maines's first commercially released work was background vocals on Pat Green's debut album, Dancehall Dreamer, produced by her father Lloyd Maines and released in 1995. At the end of 1995, at age 21, Maines joined the all-female country music band, the then named Dixie Chicks, which had been performing since 1989, but which had been unsuccessful in gaining more than local attention. Maines replaced founding lead singer Laura Lynch. She plays guitar and bass in concert in the band.[6]
Maines co-wrote four tracks for The Chicks' first three albums, including the BillboardHot Country Singles & Tracks chart number one hit "Without You" on Fly. Maines was a primary songwriter on all 14 tracks of the band's 2006 album Taking the Long Way which peaked on the Billboard 200 chart at No. 1. Taking the Long Way has the Billboard Hot 100 single "Not Ready to Make Nice", (Maines, Strayer, Erwin, Wilson) hitting No. 4[7] and for which the band won the songwriting Grammy Award, for Song of the Year. Maines considers the songwriting she did for Taking the Long Way "pure therapy" after the controversy that ensued over a comment Maines made from the stage in London that criticized U.S. President George W. Bush.[8] "Everything felt more personal this time", Maines said about the album, "there's just more maturity, depth, intelligence. ... [These songs] feel more grown-up."[9]
On May 7, 2013, Maines released a solo album entitled Mother.[11][12] This was Maines's first album since The Chicks hiatus started in 2007. The album was co-produced by Ben Harper. The album contains Maines's interpretation of several cover songs, including Pink Floyd's "Mother", Eddie Vedder's "Without You", and Jeff Buckley's "Lover, You Should've Come Over". She also sings about motherhood, feminism, and painful relationships.[11][12][13][14][15]
Maines has participated in various fundraising and awareness events. They include:
Legendary Bingo (August 23, 2007): Maines participated in "Legendary Bingo", a US bingo game hosted by drag queens and held weekly in Los Angeles. Proceeds from the event go to special charity interests; when Maines participated in the event, the proceeds benefited the "Voice for the Animals Foundation".[18]
St. Jude Benefit (June 12, 2008): Maines attended "Scrabble Under The Stars" in Beverly Hills, California. The event benefits St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. Scrabble boards autographed by celebrity attendees, including Maines, were auctioned through June 30, 2008.[19]
In 1997, Maines married her South Plains College boyfriend, bassist Michael Tarabay, and the couple moved to Nashville, Tennessee. Within two years they filed for divorce, citing irreconcilable differences.[1]
Maines met actor Adrian Pasdar in May 1999 at the wedding of bandmate Emily Erwin to Charlie Robison. Maines and Pasdar married on June 24, 2000, at A Little White Wedding Chapel in Las Vegas.[21][22][23] They have two sons.[24] During her marriage, Maines referred to herself as Natalie Pasdar.[25] Maines filed for divorce in July 2017; it was finalized in December 2019.[26] The events leading to her divorce inspired multiple songs on the 2020 album Gaslighter.[27]
Many American country music listeners supported the war, and Maines's remark triggered a backlash in the United States.[30] The Dixie Chicks were blacklisted by thousands of country radio stations,[32] and the band members received death threats.[33] Maines issued an apology, saying her remark had been disrespectful; in 2006 she rescinded the apology, saying she felt Bush deserved no respect.[32] The backlash damaged sales of their music and sales of their next album and tour.[34]
At the first US concert after Maines's comment, she said from the stage, "They told me that you may not come, but I knew you'd come because we have the greatest fans in the whole wide world."[35][36] Despite fan turnout at concerts, The Chicks began receiving death threats as circulation of the comment increased. Subsequently, security was heightened at all concert venues and metal detectors were installed where possible.[8][37] A death threat directed at Maines was received prior to the Chicks' concert of July 6, 2003, in Dallas, Texas. Maines described the threat as "scary because ... it wasn't just somebody wanting to write a hate letter. ... It was somebody who obviously thought they had a plan." Security was heightened for the trip to and from the concert venue as well as at the arena.[38]
On May 21, 2006, while promoting the release of the album Taking the Long Way, Maines recanted her 2003 apology to President Bush, saying, "I don't feel that way anymore. I don't feel he is owed any respect whatsoever. ... If people are going to ask me to apologize based on who I am ... I don't know what to do about that. I can't change who I am."[39]
Maines says she is not looking for more battles but that "The Incident," as it is referred to by the Chicks, reminded her of how she "felt in high school: to be angry, to be sure that you're right and that the things you do matter. You don't realize that you're not feeling those feelings until you do. And then you realize how much more interesting life is."[39]
Two 2006 documentaries, Protesting the Dixie Chicks and Shut Up And Sing, deal with the controversy surrounding Maines's comment and the ensuing fallout. In an interview with The Daily Telegraph on June 15, 2006, regarding the fallout from her comment, Maines again stirred up controversy by stating:
The entire country may disagree with me, but I don't understand the necessity for patriotism; 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.[40]
In 2007, the Chicks won three Grammys for "Not Ready to Make Nice" and two Grammys for Taking the Long Way, receiving all five Grammys for which they were nominated. This was seen by some as vindication for The Chicks, who were shunned by country radio programmers after Maines's remarks about President Bush. As The Chicks accepted the album of the year award, Maines said, "I think people are using their freedom of speech with all these awards. We get the message."[41]
Feud with Toby Keith
Maines had a public feud with fellow country music superstar Toby Keith over the 2002 chart-topping country hit "Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue", as well as a comment Maines made about U.S. President George W. Bush during a March 2003 Chicks concert in London.
Maines publicly criticized Keith's song "Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue" by saying, "I hate it. It's ignorant, and it makes country music sound ignorant. It targets an entire culture—and not just the bad people who did bad things. You've got to have some tact. Anybody can write, 'We'll put a boot in your ass.'"[42] Keith responded by belittling Maines's songwriting skills with, "I'll bury her. She has never written anything that has been a hit"[43] and, "That's what I do—I write songs."[44]
After Maines commented at a March 2003 Chicks concert at the Shepherd's Bush Empire theatre in London that the Chicks didn't want the Iraq War and were "ashamed" President Bush "was from Texas", Keith's 2003 "Shock'n Y'all" tour began displaying a backdrop showing a doctored photo of Maines with Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.[45] Shortly thereafter, on May 21, 2003, Maines wore a T-shirt with the letters "F.U.T.K." written on the front while performing for the Academy of Country Music Awards broadcast.[45] The Chicks website stated that the letters stood for "Freedom, United, Together in Kindness".[46] Some saw it as a well-deserved veiled insult directed at Keith.[45]
In the 2006 documentary Dixie Chicks: Shut Up and Sing, backstage footage prior to her appearance wearing the F.U.T.K. shirt recorded the conversation between Maines and Simon Renshaw and confirmed that the original intent of the shirt was in response to Keith's criticism of her: the letters stood for "Fuck You Toby Keith".[25] As of January 2007, Keith continued to refuse to say Maines's name and argues that the doctored photos displayed during his concerts were intended to express his feeling that Maines's criticism was tyrannical and a dictator-like attempt to squelch Keith's free speech.[47]
West Memphis Three lawsuit
Maines and other members of The Chicks participated in a rally in Little Rock, Arkansas, in late 2007, in support of the West Memphis Three, three imprisoned men convicted of the 1993 murder of three young boys in West Memphis, Arkansas. On August 19, 2011, Maines joined with Pearl Jam frontman Eddie Vedder in Jonesboro, Arkansas, supporting the release of the West Memphis Three.[48]
