Not ready to make nice

So there I was just this past Sunday night, sitting in the living room with my roommate, patiently waiting for the start of the final episode of Survivor. We had about fifteen minutes before Survivor started, so we were each doing our own thing. He was on his computer, and I was writing in my journal.

Whatever CBS news program that was on (60 Minutes), however, quickly caught our attention. The focus? The Dixie Chicks and the release of their upcoming album "Taking the Long Way" (due out May 23) which includes the song "Not Ready to Make Nice."

The interviewer (Steve Kroft) was just so grating, it was impossible to ignore him. The story centered on the backlash that the Dixie Chicks faced after the "London incident" where Natalie Maines said that she was ashamed that President Bush was from her home state of Texas. It was the eve of the U.S. invasion of Iraq for goodness sake--we should have all been ashamed and outrages that we were going to war!

What I found so annoying about Kroft was that he kept asking questions primarily based in the market/economy and the business of music. Don't get me wrong, I fully understand that as an industry there are billions of dollars at stake in music, but any pretense of music as art seemed totally beyond Kroft's imagination. And so the focus of his interview was shaded by this frame that prizes business and money over all else.

"Anybody ever tell you one of the big rules of the music business, or business in general, is never try to antagonize your customers?" Kroft asked, laughing.

Oh if that didn't make me want to just...

In any case, I loved Maines' come back

Well, that's what music is. That's what the music I always admired and liked was. I didn't like, I saw no honesty in people being safe or opinionless...I always loved the music that was about something.

Thank goodness that we're not all so much slaves to capitalism that we've given up having opinions and speaking them. Viva la Dixie Chicks! I wasn't planning on buying their album before, but I sure will now--and props to Starbucks for carrying it!

If you want, check out the story from CBS's site.