The Chicks Explain Dropping ‘Dixie’ From Their ‘Stupid’ Name: ‘We Wanted to Change It Years Ago’
Chris Willman Music WriterThe trio formerly known as the Dixie Chicks — now just the Chicks — say in a newly published interview with the New York Times that they considered their name “stupid” and had long wanted to change it before doing so in June amid a national reconsideration of Confederate symbolism.“We were literally teenagers when we picked that stupid name,” said Martie Maguire, talking about when the Dixie Chicks name was chosen in 1989, long before Natalie Maines joined the group, as a comical derivation of the Little Feat song “Dixie Chicken.”“We wanted to change it years and years and years ago,” said Maines, adding, “I just wanted to separate myself from people that wave that Dixie flag.” The group’s third member, Emily