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Now
Naw buddy don't go shakin yer head bout
them Dixie Chicks no more, cause I seen it with my own eyes up
close. Them girls'z hot, got hot lix, hot dam pipes, and a bramble
of fans so thick y'd only get yourself scratched up tryin to
part em from each other and their grrrls.
But before I tell you about
how they punked the prez, and threw in a Dylan tune at the encore,
let's get onto that city bus in A-Town, ATX, Austin, Live Music
Capital of the World where tonight we're smelling some off-regulation
popcorn (cuz tecknickally speaking the buses don't allow no food
or drink) and singing out loud, some "Shut Up" song
(still off regulation, because the rules say no such noise) and
talkin about how we're going to get this act together in the
studio tomorrow morning, spin a hit, and share the money with
the driver. But then, ding dang, the lead singer has to get
off the bus, leaving the rest of the new-formed duo headed down
to Sixth Street or East Twelfth for two hours of musical intoxication.
Inside the Frank Erwin Center
shortly after 8pm, Pete Yorn has had the courtesy and good sense
to take a bow after eight songs, leaving the hometown welcome
party of ten thousand folks buzzing it up during a preview trailer
of "Shut Up and Sing" the new documentary about the
Chicks and recent world history. Here is a clip of the president
walking on some tarmac saying out loud that he doesn't see why
the Chicks'd get their feelings hurt if people stop buying their
records, cut to front-Chick Natalie Maines reading about that
quip, shaking her head, and saying out loud, dumfuk!
The buzzing Chick fest is actually
paying attention to the film, you can tell, because up from the
lower bowl of the Erwin Center, and down from the upper seats
collides a crash of clapping and hollering. As in, you tell
it Natalie! And we're right here for you. Yes ma'am, dumfuk's
a pretty good word for what you're aiming at.
This kind of thing is going
to go on for nearly another hour before the Chicks finally get
their boots on stage, but who cares if they're another minute
late? Let em take their time. Still somewhere in the back of
your mind you know the Chicks are tuned into baby sitter schedules
on this Monday night. And if it's not until about nine o'clock
that they come out, that still leaves plenty of time to get our
eighty dollars worth of musical festivity and get the baby sitters
home before midnight.
But not everyone has left their
kids at home. Chicks themselves have brought some kids, say
the bloggers. And I see a handful of really young ones, definitely
elementary school. Also some grrrls in soccer oufits ready to
kick some you know what. Wildcats, could be from Elgin, which
is not exactly next door.
But speaking of Chicks and
grrrls, let me count some heads. Along the row in front of me
(mighty, mighty Section 39) there's one extra large white fellow
with well-trimmed gray hair in embroidered, starched shirt who
should be mentioned for his singular status in a row with a chick
to cock ratio of 19 to 1. Then, counting down the aisle seats
we find three cock heads for a chick to cock ratio of 13-3.
If the count is not scientific it is satisfactory nevertheless
and enough of a statistical challenge for me tonight.
Sniffing at the light bouquet
of cotton candy, light beer, and wine, I am delighted at the
longitudinal arrays of white folk demographics that chat it up
all around. Spectacles on faces of gray-beards suggest alphabet
street intellectuals. Starched and creased Wranglers hint of
Spring Rodeo attire. A long haired stoner in Stones-jacket denim
goes way down the aisle, tongue out the whole time. Of course
whole book clubs or whatever of women have come together. And
here's a guy in starched red shirt waving with his cell phone
pressed to an ear. Can you see me now?
Up the aisle comes a woman
who studies the steps the way I sometimes used to study center
stripes on Saturday nights. Behind her an angel in well presented
cleavage and pointy pink shoes. Out in the concourse those soccer
girls we talked about, studying the prices on t-shirts (up to
$85 dollars). And a tiny woman in wheel chair coming out of
the powder room, as if "the day" wants you to see everything
once before you return to your seat.
Stage lights down. House lights
dimmed. "Hail to the Chief" cranked up. And this
can mean only one thing. Here they come. The moral leaders
of our Southern fried culture launch into "Lubbock or Leave
It." And the audience is on our feet!
Singing to the soul of Buddy
Holly, "I hear they hate me now / Just like they hated you
/ Maybe when I'm dead and gone / I'm gonna get a statue too."
Oh, the audience loves that line! Applause rises to the top
like cream.
The fierce red color of the
video screens (six of them towering in back of the stage, two
per Chick) now turns purple, the tempo slows, the drawls extend,
the harmonies part wider, and now we're in the middle of "Truth
No. 2" in which the heroine and her sweet backup singers
strike a deal with you: "Swing me way down south / Sing
me something brave from your mouth / And I'll bring you Pearls
of water on my hips / And the love in my lips / All the love
from my lips." Just so you know that the wages of courage
ain't all pain.
When the house lights brighten,
well-prepared fans hold up signs, which I can't read, but if
you go to Junichi's blog you can find some likelihood of the
kinds of signs there were: The Only Bush I Trust is My Own.
Natalie UR My Heroes. To Think without Speaking is to Aim without
Shooting: Thanks for Speaking.
And now, with the sisters who
founded the Dixie Chicks flanking the far corners of the stage--Emily
Erwin Robinson and Martie Erwin McGuire--it's time once again
to kill ol' Earl. Look if you don't know the story I can't be
responsible for your complete education, but you should know
that when they get to the line, "Earl had to die",
the whole place pitches in, fists punching the air three times
hard.
"Hello Austin," says
Natalie. And yes, we're ready for that. "Thank you,"
she says once to the standing ovation. Then "thank you"
again. And finally, "thank you very much for your warm
welcome." Well, we do love being here is the bottom line.
This could be Kant's Summum Bonum where duty to the truth lives
right in the moment of ecstasy. So I have to put down my pen
to form a proper four-finger whistle. Can you believe were making
all this out of a Monday night?
Now I'm a back-bencher myself
when it comes to these sorts of things, so I don't see the woman
that Natalie Maines is talking to next. But San Antonio reporter
Hector Saldaña writes that it was a "female fan toward
the front of the stage" and I take his word for it.
"I see you're not wearing
panties until the war is over," says Maines, "At least
Britney Spears isn't." At this point my handwriting goes
into spastic scrawl, and I think I must be going deaf. I resist
the well-intentioned urge to lean over to the seat in front of
me and whisper into the ear of the married woman wearing big
diamond and the tour t-shirt: "did she say 'panties'?"
So thanks Hector for being in the middle of the action up there
and reporting on this anti-Lysistrata presence with an unflinching
hand.
"Just don't make Paris
Hilton your chaperone," says Maines as she promises to sing
more songs between her jokes. Thanks to the multi-camera video
screen high above Natalie's head, we can see how her face goes
all devilish in a good way. Chick can act funny. Paris Hilton,
Britney Spears, and Natalie Maines. Yes, they do belong in the
same breath tonight, flanked by the Erwin grrrls here at what
is for this brief moment aptly named The Erwin Center.
"This next song we wrote
because we were getting calls from the White House asking, 'how
is it you make these fantastic career decision you make',"
jokes Maines as the band digs into "Taking the Long Way."
Here's a little autobiography for you about paths taken and
paths not. "I met the queen of whatever / Drank with the
Irish and smoked with the hippies / Moved with the shakers /
Wouldn't kiss all the asses that they told me to." It's
another of the night's top applause lines.
As the Chicks harmonize into
memories of the top of the world come crashing down, I'm counting
the back-up band. From left to right a pedal steel, keyboard,
electric guitar, drum, bass, acoustic guitar, another electric
guitar, and later, a violin. Damn, it's practically a Bob Wills
orchestra! (Of course if you go to Jovita's any Thursday night
you can catch the Cornell Hurd band playing up to a dozen pieces
from different parts of the room! But that's another story.)
Next song begins with an Erwin
sister picking on the mandolin in that style that says we love
you, Lindsey Buckingham, and can only mean it's time for Fleetwood
Mac's "Landslide," which is Chick music to the bone,
fellas, and a longing for freedom along dimensions that don't
often get discussed on the AP wire.
Then the Chicks sing Trisha
Yearwood's "Standing Out in a Crowd" from a stage where
Trisha Yearwood has played. Three guys down front go for more
beer, which is bad vibe for the cocks, because right now they're
standing out in a bad way as we watch their asses block our views.
Could've waited for a stand up song, you know, or a break. But
what break?
Anyway this next song was written
with Pete Yorn after they had all viewed the rough cut of the
documentary, "Shut Up and Sing," and it's about "that
annoying blonde neighbor that won't go away." Of course
the song was welcomed into the documentary soundtrack right away.
Sister Emily hits some hot licks on a lap steel and we're into
"The Neighbor" which according to chickaholic at the
tripod henhouse hasn't come out yet on CD.
Violins introduce "Cowboy
Take Me Away," colors turn purple, cell phones go up as
lights, and the audience sings along with the chorus: "Set
me free oh I pray."
"Just in case anyone was
wondering whether I was too cool for school," says Natalie,
"let me introduce you to my omnichord." Well it does
seem like a toy, and she's joking about the silliness of it,
but the omnichord listing at wikipedia lists some impressive
musicians who have toyed with it. Still, in order not to confuse
our sense of sophistication, Maines announces that the song will
be played in the key of C and her son Slade (one of seven children
of the band, four of whom were born here in Austin) has requested
cell lights throughout the house.
Well, of course, the cell lights
go up. And we are now in heaven, there are so many stars, listening
to "Lullaby" with easy going accompaniment, unplugged
like. "How long do you want to be loved / Is forever enough,
'cause I'm never never / Givin' you up." At which point
the audience is cheering in delightful affirmation for their
own little ones.
And speaking of family love,
Natalie returns to the theme of Britney Spears in order to explain
why she has been totally thrown off her game with regard to her
allegiances in the whole Britney-Kevin custody feud. I have
just done the internet research that Maines suggested as a follow
up, to find a photo mercifully "censored" in just the
right place. So I can "see" why Maines is asking if
"this is describable or even worth discussing? I mean she
knows there are photographers around. Oh, my Gawd. I didn't
know she had stretch marks!" At which point really it is
time to dedicate this next song to Kevin Federline and shut up
and sing.
"I can't afford no ring
/ I can't afford no ring / You shouldn't be wearing white and
I can't afford no ring." It's the opening stanza for "White
Trash Wedding" and we are out here laughing as the Chicks
do this in hard-fast mountain style, you know, like they was
singing from a porch in that movie Deliverance, and here comes
Kevin and Britney walkin' up a dirt trail barefoot. Which they
follow up with some instrumental bluegrass as if reading our
minds.
But if you think this is the
high point of the evening, well you don't quite understand white
trash art, because seriousness is about to happen. Several days
before the Grammy nominations were announced, the audience was
already treating the next song like something very special.
With the opening chords of
"Not Ready to Make Nice" there is a kind of tremor
that breaks open all around. Up from the lower steps comes rushing
a woman at top speed, leaping like an Impala. Red pants, black
shirt, coming right up at you in a blur of tip top desire.
"Come on!" she hollers
to friends who have just returned from a break in the concourse.
"I'm coming to get your ass!" And back down the aisle
she leads them, quickly as that. Meanwhile, the house lights
come up, and the crowd is on its feet, hollering and whistling.
This is what a hit feels like in the round. No question this
is top of the night, and the Chicks know how to play it precisely.
They are going to win this Grammy, because you can see all around
you that the song is a national treasure. Not a hurt feeling
left in the house.
Although the next song--"Long
Time Gone"--begins with a banjo riff, Opry style, the unplugged
part of the concert has passed and the hot guitar licks start
pumping things up. The drummer is back in action, and Natalie
is encouraging the audience to clap along, which we do, just
as the keyboards kick in with some Al Kooper coolness.
Somewhere in this swirl we've
transitioned into another song with its striking (even for the
Dixie Chicks striking) vocal punctuations of "I Hope."
And when the three singers converge on the word lovingly, well,
how can you not hope to highest heavens that we can actually
work it out that way? In fine Willie Nelson fashion we are closing
up this concert with a Gospel revival, and you do feel like you
could fly away.
Which makes "Songbird"
such a fine choice as Natalie and company sing us to the top
of the world, and when we get there, Natalie takes a seat on
the drum stand, listening with us to the string instrumentals
that swirl around up up here in heaven.
"We'd like to thank everybody
for coming out to the show tonight," says Maines. "This
is still our favorite song from the first album." And with
the opening notes of "Wide Open Spaces" we're on our
feet again.
But what's this, one more song?
"Sin Wagon" with the devil and Martie keeping tempo
on the violin, Charlie Daniels style.
"Thank you so much! Good
night"
To which we can only reply,
fat chance!
Thunderous, yes, we are. Stomping,
hollering, whistling, clapping, and taking breath to do it all
over again. We ain't moving one inch. We ain't shuttin up.
We're trying to shake it all the way out to the freeway where
drivers will wonder if the Balcones Fault has suddenly given
way, looking in their rear-views for some of that St. Elmo's
Fire.
Which all this noize, after
a while, the Dixie Chicks have to respond to, even though we
do hope they enjoyed seeing how long this would go on and for
how loud. So they come back out, just the three of them, guitar,
Dobro, and violin, and they stand close together and sing "Travelin'
Soldier." No time for dry eyes, this song, these days.
"We only know one song
by ourselves," jokes Natalie, helping us up out of that
war casualty mood, "so we'll bring the band back out."
Maines is introducing the band and telling a story about how
right before the show, but later than they were supposed to be,
the Chicks asked to see "Pete" and instead of Pete
Yorn being returned to them, they got their own band member back,
the wrong "Pete." Okay, at least she doesn't go for
the Peter joke, it's so rude to make fun of people's names that
way.
Then Maines announces that
they're going to do some Bob Dylan. I should have known this
was possible, but I didn't, which made it even better. They
put a bounce in the tempo and Maines fired the lyrics in semi-automatic
bursts: "The emptiness is endless, gold is gray / You can
always go back, but you can't go back all the way / Well there's
only one thing that I did wrong / I stayed in Mississippi a day
too long."
And finally, of course, the
Dixie Chicks were, "Ready to Run." They sang it, then
they did it, and it was perfect time to think about baby sitters
and Tuesday morning, so the crowd broke quickly this time. But
we just want y'all to know, things would have gone on differently
had it been a Friday or Saturday night.
"Thank you so much Austin,
we'll see you next time." Yes ma'am you sure will. On
that Grammy victory lap, perhaps.
But one more thing before we
find a bus home. Outside in the chilly air is an organizer,
and this brilliant young white man is handing out little flyers
for the Barak Obama campaign for President. You pundits who
have written off the white vote in the South? Go back and read
the beginning of this article. There's a word up there for you.
CounterPunch
Speakers Bureau Sick of sit-on-the-Fence speakers, tongue-tied and timid?
CounterPunch Editors Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St Clair
are available to speak forcefully on ALL the burning issues,
as are other CounterPunchers seasoned in stump oratory. Call
CounterPunch Speakers Bureau, 1-800-840-3683. Or email beckyg@counterpunch.org.
