Natalie Maines Shows Her Rock Roots On 'Mother'

It's been nearly seven years since the Dixie Chicks released its last album, 2006's Taking The Long Way, a critically-liked, but divisive record that went on to win five Grammy Awards. And while bandmates and sisters Emily Robison and Martie Maguire put out a duo record in 2010 as the Court Yard Hounds, fans of Natalie Maines, the rebellious and politically outspoken lead singer of the Dixie Chicks, have had to wait much longer for new music.

But now, after such a long absence from recording, Maines is back with a solo record, Mother. And for those longtime fans expecting another collection of country music anthems, the album might come as something of a surprise. Instead, Maines, who says she didn't grow up a country music fan, pulls from the rock influences of her childhood.

The record, co-produced with singer and guitarist Ben Harper, mixes originals with a handful of cover songs, including the title track "Mother" by Pink Floyd and "Without You," a song by Pearl Jam's Eddie Vedder. 

Natalie Maines, on joining the Dixie Chicks, despite rebelling against country music as a child:

I wasn’t a fan of what I had seen them do before. I liked them as people, but they wore Western fringe from head to toe and big cowboy hats, and I had never worn a cowboy hat in my life. I loved the song that they wrote [and asked me to sing at a tryout]. My instincts just told me that our two worlds could meld and create something kind of cool.

On moving in a direction away from country on Mother:

It just felt like me. I didn’t have to think about the direction: What is this going to be? What am I going to be? I think this is the part of me that I brought to the Dixie Chicks. [But for this record] I got to have all the say-so and do what I wanted. The instrumentation is different, and there is some three-part harmony with [producer] Ben [Harper]. But I knew I wanted it to not sound like something the Dixie Chicks could do, because then why do it?

On making country music without the traditional support of a country fanbase:

I don’t think this album is directed toward a country audience. We’ve been out of that world since they banned us in 2003. So even though we made another album [Taking The Long Way in 2006], it definitely wasn’t for country music. We didn’t care if anybody played it. We made it for ourselves.