The Chicks march into new tour with trademark fearlessness: 'We still love it'

Natalie Maines has been working out daily, finally feeling comfortable enough in a COVID-19 environment to go hiking near her Los Angeles home.

Her partners in The Chicks, sisters Martie Maguire and Emily Strayer, “always stay in touring shape," she jokes with an affectionate eye roll.

Even so, it’s understandable that the trio needed some time to transform into road warriors again.

More than two decades since they began performing as a group, with 13 Grammy Awards, five headlining tours and sales of 33 million albums, it’s…been a minute for The Chicks.

Their eighth studio album, “Gaslighter,” a trove of achingly personal – and sometimes deliciously barbed – lyrics coupled with their rich balance of visceral pop coated with a country twang, arrived in July 2020. A month earlier, the band announced it would drop a familiar part of its name – Dixie – because of its affiliation with the Civil War-era South. (“We want to meet this moment,” they said at the time, during the George Floyd-inspired summer of protests for justice.)

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Nearly two years later, The Chicks, chatting via video from Los Angeles and Texas, are resolute in their decision.

“I don’t pay attention much to social media. Were people mad?” Maines says with a sly smile.

“I wasn’t really taking people’s opinion on it,” Strayer adds. “It’s your persona, your name, your identity.”

“We always referred to ourselves as The Chicks,” Maines says. “We were already getting away from the Dixie, using DCX on merchandise, because we weren’t feeling that word. When we discussed what to name this tour, we realized we’d never toured as The Chicks.”

That road run, simply dubbed The Chicks Tour, kicks off Tuesday in St. Louis and will keep the band roaming the country through Aug. 13. It's their first tour since DCX MMXVI wrapped in 2017, and their first live performances since a visit to pal Ellen DeGeneres’ talk show days before the pandemic lockdown in 2020.

All three Chicks are eager to feel the live-music adrenaline jolt, and especially the opportunity to finally play songs from their latest release – including the striking protest anthem “March March” and swooping title track.

And considering their catalog of hits accumulated after nearly 25 years, fan favorites such as  “Not Ready to Make Nice” “The Long Way Around,” “Long Time Gone” and “Ready to Run” will likely squeeze onto the set list.

“I enjoy (our live shows) like a concert even though I’m in the concert,” Maguire says with a laugh. “We love touring. It gets grueling toward the end and a bit of a grind, but we still love it.”

Maines’ son, Slade, 21, is an official member of the live band and will play guitars, synthesizers and piano. It’s a generational guard-changing of sorts, considering Maines’ father, revered country guitarist Lloyd, frequently joined the trio onstage.

“When my dad would play with us, people would tell off-color jokes and I’d be like, ‘STOP, that’s my dad!’ Now I feel that way about my son,” she says.

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Joining The Chicks on varying dates are Patty Griffin – who opened for the band on its first headlining tour in 2000 – and Jenny Lewis, whom Strayer discovered when Lewis opened for Harry Styles on his 2021 Love on Tour.

It’s been nearly 20 years since The Chicks inflamed the cultural landscape with their comments about then-President George W. Bush (“We’re ashamed the president of the United States is from Texas,” Maines said onstage of their shared home state), but it feels like a lifetime ago.

The band weathered the fallout – famously sweeping the 2007 Grammy Awards with their “Taking the Long Way” album and pointed hit, “Not Ready to Make Nice” – and recalled that fearlessness when making “Gaslighter.”

“You’re baring your soul and your mistakes and your wars, but this is the first time I’ve felt the least inhibited about throwing stuff out there,” says Strayer, crediting co-producer Jack Antonoff for inspiring that creative freedom.

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“This album made me feel more confident as a writer,” Maines says. “Having (co-producer) Teddy Geiger playing a synth, it unlocked so many melodic ideas for me.”

While The Chicks swear it won’t be another 14-year gap until their next album – 2006’s “Taking the Long Way” preceded “Gaslighter,” their final release under their seven-album contract with Sony Music – they are enthusiastic about the future as free agents.

“We like having a label, but it’s been over 20 years with an archaic contract,” Maines says. “It will be nice to redo that.”

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: The Chicks start summer tour to support Gaslighter album