So congrats to the Dixie Chicks on 5 Grammys. I can't honestly say I've heard but one song off the album as I'm not a big country listener. I have a couple of Loretta Lynn albums and Elvis Costello has taken a couple of turns at recording country music but most of it's a bit too twangy for me and honestly the modern stuff seems to lack depth.
They have been, and continue to get a lot of flack for including political commentary in their work "shut up and sing" I think is the refrain. Since when has art and politics/religion been separate? Commentary has always been a part of art, that's part of what draws us to it. Peisistratus an early tyrant (not the same meaning we currently assign to it) of Ancient Greece commissioned the first Tragedy to sing his praises to the people and so it begins...today that continues whether it be in a hymn praising Christ or in a song by the Dixie Chicks or Pink or Bob Dylan or Neil Young. If you don't like the message, fine don't listen. I'm an Atheist but I still find great beauty in religious music, especially when it is sung by a true believer with a great deal of passion.
Music that doesn't come from a place of passion and belief can hardly be called art.
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