Dixie Chicks Begin Tour in S.C. Concert: EVERYBODY LOVES FRENCHY!

ABCNEWS.COM ^ | TODAY | AP

[Cinnamon Girl]

The Dixie Chicks let the music speak for themselves at least for the first 10 minutes of their first concert.

"We have a plan for this," lead singer Natalie Maines said after the band's first set Thursday night. "If you're here to boo, we welcome that. We're going to give you 15 seconds to do that."

And when Maines counted to three, the sold-out crowd erupted in cheers and the Chicks broke into "Long Time Gone."

There was never a doubt the 15,000-seat Bi-Lo Center supported the Chicks. They spent the time between acts doing the wave and urging the band to come out.

Finally they did. If there was a boo as the band rose from below the stage and a 40-foot drapery lifted, no one could hear it.

The cheers Thursday night were a lot different from what the band has been hearing.

The group's popularity has taken a beating since Maines made a negative remark about President Bush.

Tickets for the 15,000-seat arena were sold out before Maines' comments. However, a radio host has pushed for fans here to trade in their tickets for an anti-Chicks concert, and about 15 protesters milled outside the venue before the main event.

Protesters carried sings saying "The three French hens" and "Nothing Dixie about these Chicks."

The Dixie Chicks controversy began when Maines told a London audience March 10: "Just so you know, we're ashamed the president of the United States is from Texas."

The comment was made as war was looming with Iraq, and Maines later apologized.

However, sales of their album "Home" have dropped sharply and many country radio stations pulled their music from their playlists. In recent interviews, the trio has said their lives, and the lives of their families, have been threatened.

Maines "said something in another country she shouldn't have said," said Doug Gray, lead singer of the Marshall Tucker Band, which is performing at Thursday's alternative concert, to be held 30 miles away in Spartanburg.

But some people, including Bruce Springsteen, have come to the group's defense, and even in South Carolina, home of many flag-waving patriots, the group has plenty of supporters.

"Just as people are unhappy with Natalie Maines, people are unhappy with us," said nationally syndicated radio talk show host Mike Gallagher, who is promoting the anti-Dixie Chicks concert.

Gray, a former sergeant in Vietnam, said he also received threats but it's not going to stop him from taking the stage. He knows his concert probably won't affect the Dixie Chicks, which have sold out most of the 59 concerts for this tour.

"It's not going to hurt them as much as people would like it to," Gray said. But "it's really good for us."

At least 100 holders of the highest-priced Dixie Chicks tickets traded in their tickets for free VIP passes to the show, according to Gallagher. Listeners were being urged to donate money to help buy tickets for military families to attend the event. Not all of the 3,200 tickets had been sold by midday Thursday.

The family of 20-year-old Marine Pvt. Nolen Ryan Hutchings, who died in Iraq, lives in a Spartanburg suburb and said they planned to attend the Marshall Tucker show. A ceremony was planned during the concert to honor the fallen soldier.

Metal detectors will be used for the Dixie Chicks' show, and there will be a significant security presence for the Marshall Tucker Band show, organizers said.

Clearly the controversy was on everyone's mind. Opening act Joan Osborne took less than 10 minutes before she addressed the crowd, urging them to cheer for the Chicks.

"Unless you've been living under a rock, you know what these girls have been going through the last month," said Osborne, who got cheers when she asked the crowd to show her a "sample of the love that's going to come their way when they get on stage."

[okiesap]

These bimbos are the left's new heroes and I fully expect their music to change accordingly. I have an uneasy feeling that many concertgoers will admire Natalie Maines for making them "politically aware " and, rather than watching sitcoms on election day 2004, will turn out to cast anti-Bush votes.

Wait, I hear music..... its a fiddle...... balloons are everywhere.....Bill and Hillary are dancing like Jed and Granny at the Democrats National Convention

[SierraWasp]

On the radio today, a girl was being interviewed about the Chicks concert and she said she had driven 16 hours from Mass. to be at the concert. The attendees apparently are not just from SC.
Mrs. Sierra Wasp

[Hillarys Gate Cult]

How about the manure the left keeps spewing about a sold out show? They act like the tour sold out after Maines opened her trap. The tour sold out before she said it. I would still like to see what the attendance really was. People were stuck with the tickets since there were no refunds.

Sales of their next tour will tell the story

[SierraWasp]

I imagine that some SC's cancelled or sold their tickets after Maines opened her mouth and then the leftists bought them just to show support for her.
For some reason those people do so much better in supporting each other publicly than conservatives.
Mrs. Wasp

[DennisR]

"Do the people who went to the concert just not care, agree, or didn't know about the controversy?"

My theory is that they are either apathetic, concur, or are just ignorant. :)

[EaglesUpForever]

Sad but true.

[Bonaparte]

Thanks for the update!

[fatima]

ps---Joan is also an abortion activist and a director of Planned Parenthood.

I guess the Dixie Chicks' choice of opening act show how much they think of their fans.
Thanks for that info.

[SierraWasp]

While attempting to analyze people's actions regarding the Ditzie Chicks, one has to refer back to Jane Fonda's actions during Viet Nam. In spite of how disgusting that was to see her up on that enemy anti-aircraft gun and cavorting with our enemy, citizens of the U.S. still went to her movies and bought her exercise videos. She should have been hung for treason! Go figure?
Mrs Sierra Wasp

[Cinnamon Girl]

Re Joan Osborne's music and politics: DISGUSTING.

[Cinnamon Girl]

Maybe the entire audience drove down from Massachusetts.

[cyberaxe]

Maybe the entire audience drove down from Massachusetts.

.....nope.....

.....but the way this place has grown over the last 5 years.....

.....I'd bet that at least 65% of the folks at the concert.....

....."wern't from around here".....
.....(not born in Greenville, SC).....

.....lotsa transplanted yankees down here ya know!.....

[SierraWasp]

Yep, same is happening here only the southeren californian conservatives are moving north in droves and bringing with them the liberal Rodney King attitude - "Can't we all just get along?"

Must be that desire to become "compassionate conservatives".
Mrs. Sierra Wasp

[Some hope remaining.]

If God had a face, what would it look like and would you wanna see If seeing meant that you would have to believe in things like Heaven and Jesus and the Saints and all the Prophets and...

I think this pretty much sums up a lot of the world today. They don't want to see/know because then they'd have to believe and live accordingly.

[cyberaxe]

"compassionate conservatives"

.....hey, didn't they know.....

.....conservative = compassion.....

.....at least that's what they taught me.....

.....in Sunday School.....

[ThomasMore]

I don't really care what happened. I know I'll never buy another one of their CDs or listen to them or go to one of their concerts. They have slapped me in the face with their agenda when they dissed President Bush. They were ashamed he was a Texan. I'm ashamed they are Americans.

[Joe_October]

I won't buy any either and I don't read anything into last night's concert. 15,000 people for a Dixie Chicks concert is no big deal. The kids are idiots and they will go just to see what the big deal is. I thought it was a 50,000 seat thing. That would be a big deal.

Sad thing is that these young women are talented performers but unfortunately, they are idiot liberals and frauds.

[padfoot_lover]

This bears repeating.....

The true measure of the backlash will be in CD sales and FUTURE sales of live performance tickets.

[DennisR]

The only answer to this is that the world must be upside down!