The Chicks have discussed changing their band name this year, and how the murder of George Floyd spurred them on in their decision.
The trio – fka the Dixie Chicks – announced that they were to drop the ‘Dixie’ from their name back in June, a month in which Black Lives Matter protests spread across the globe following Floyd’s death in Minneapolis in late May.
In a new interview with The Independent, The Chicks discussed the thought process behind the name change. Martie Maguire said: “People who live in the South have lived with the word ‘Dixie’ and the [Confederate] flag for a long time.
“And a lot of people not thinking of the connotations of it. I think about Dixieland music, and the flag is everywhere, but you definitely feel like you have to wake up and mature up and go well, wait a minute, no, this is hurtful, this is something that has very negative connotations. And it takes a movement.
She added: “If Black Lives Matter and George Floyd’s murder hadn’t happened, we might’ve waited another couple of years, I don’t know, but it definitely lit a fire in us to be on the right side of history.”
At the time of the name change, The Chicks said they “want to meet this moment” and remove any racist connotations in their band name.
It came soon after writer Jeremy Helligar said in a column that the trio should rethink their name because “regardless of its origin, for many Black people, it conjures a time and a place of bondage”.
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