The Chicks — formerly known as the Dixie Chicks — stopped by The Late Show With Stephen Colbert on July 16th to play new music and discuss their recent name change.
The band released their new album Gaslighter yesterday (July 17th), and appeared on Colbert to promote its release.
Performing ‘March March’ from the album, the Chicks were not shy in discussing politics or the decision to change their name. ‘March March’ is inspired by the 2018 March for Our Lives youth protest against gun violence, and the band’s performance exudes the tension and anger that only protesting can bring.
The Chicks also spoke with Colbert himself at length. Covering almost a decade of developments, they did find time to chat about changing their name from Dixie Chicks.
“Well, it’s because of everything that’s going on in the world,” lead singer Natalie Maines said.
“It was about time; we’ve wanted to change it for a long time, actually. We started using ‘DCX’ a lot and ‘the Chicks’ a lot whenever we could — we hoped it would catch on, but it didn’t. So, in the moment now, we just felt that it was right, and we didn’t even have to have much discussion about it. We just all wanted to do it right away, and so we did.”
The Chicks revealed that there were other contenders for the name, including “Puss in Boots” and “M.E.N.” (which is made up of their initials: Martie, Emily and Natalie).
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They also spoke about their most infamous political moment — speaking out against previous President George W. Bush. Plus, they revealed what it was like to delay their new album due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We were really excited, and we are really excited, for our fans to hear the new album, but we were also following that up with a tour,” Maines said. “We were supposed to be on tour this summer, our first show was supposed to be June 6th. Both my sons have bands, they’re awesome musicians, and they were gonna open for us. But like the rest of the world, plans changed.”
Check out The Chicks discuss why they changed their name on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert:
