Gaslighter, Joe

When the Chicks excised the word "Dixie" from their name, I was taken by surprise. Not because I think that the members of the Chicks are in any way callous or craven, but mostly because I had never even considered the possibility that the word "Dixie" might have negative connotations. There's always room to educate yourself, however, so after reading about how that word is connected with the idea of slavery, I now back the change. Even if you account for the possibility that the majority of the population didn't think the word has anything to do with racism, what's the harm in taking it away? Why purposefully want to keep a word in your name that is even 1% racist? But my point is that I just didn't fucking know or care before the Chicks brought the matter to my attention.

Another thing I didn't know or care about before this week was the Chicks themselves. I've always known that they were allies, their comments about being ashamed of G.W. Bush coming about a year before my liberal-minded high school lunch table discussed the fact that Bush was a war criminal. But as far as the music goes, I always assumed they were a progressive aberration in but also very much a part of a conservative and very boring country music scene.

So suffice it to say that I was wrong. Either that, or Gaslighter doesn't sound like anything the Chicks have ever done before. But let's assume that they've always been this effortlessly catchy, and I've just been wrong this whole time.

I'm really appreciative of the fact that most of these songs come from a personal space, as opposed to an outwardly political. I hate trump as much as the next guy, but I don't necessarily need to be awash in references to his ghoulish behavior. Instead, any such political beliefs on this record are seen through the lens of intimate details. All men are pigs, true, but the message lands harder when the Chicks refer to an incident about infidelity on a boat, and allow you to extrapolate from there.

There's also this quiet sense of maturity throughout the album that I've come to enjoy the more times I listen to Gaslighter. The situations described are firmly from an adult perspective, i.e. nostalgia is rarely used as a crutch (which is surprising with Jack Antonoff producing this record, nostalgia is kind of that dude's specialty). If the past is spoken about, usually the narrator jumps 20 years into the present and uses that past experience as a lesson. And there are moments that can only happen as an adult, like when you are tempted to laugh at your husband's brazen adultery before realizing the emotional toll this is gonna take on your sons. I guess what I'm saying is that I personally am used to taking part in the nostalgia machine, so I was taken by surprise that the Chicks were so adept at staying firmly planted in the present.

And it should go without saying that none of this would be noteworthy at all if the hits weren't there. I thought for sure that this was going to be one of those situations where I say "I appreciate the message but I really don't like the music sorry" (in other words, I was expecting another Highwomen situation), but that's far from where I landed with Gaslighter. The Chicks seem to have consciously or unconsciously abandoned any pretense that they are a country music band, and this is a good thing, as far as I'm concerned.

From the starry-eyed synth ballad of "Julianna Calm Down" (the most Antonoff-ish song here), to the military beat of "March March" (admittedly the song that is a bit too overtly political for my musical tastes), to pop-folk groove of "Texas Man" (a song title that is way more country than the music within it), to the snarky break-up acoustic jam of "Tights on My Boat" (love the fourth wall break of "Yeah, that was a real thing!"), the songs are there. I could give or take the multiple slow serenades we're hit with at the end of the album, but by the time we reach them (starting with "Young Man"), the Chicks have already far exceeded my expectations.

So if there's anything I can take from my experiences with this week's album, it's that I always have more to learn. There's the whole "Dixie" thing, which I appreciate on a human level, sure. But more importantly in the context of an album review, I've learned that the Chicks are worthy of our attention. They've crafted a mature and pleasant pop album that says volumes without being cliché in any 2020-is-a-hellscape sort of way.

GRADE: 3.5 puke out of 5

You can probably ignore the follow postscripts:

P.S. I couldn't fit this into the review proper, but the first thing I thought about when the Chicks changed their name was my family's 2002 Disney World vacation. We were supposed to stay at Dixie Landings resort, but late in 2001, Dixie Landings was absorbed into its sister hotel, Port Orleans. I literally thought nothing of it until this week, when I did some research, and yeah, it looks like Disney was taking an early measure to wash away the racial implications of the word "Dixie." I'm not bringing this up to say that I'm "proud" of a multi-billion-dollar corporation for doing this, because unlike the Chicks, excising "Dixie" really was a craven opportunity for Disney. My only point is that I clearly had a noted opportunity to learn about that word almost two decades ago, and it took me until now to care, so that's on me.

P.P.S. Couldn't fit this dig in either, but if you want to see the wrong way of changing your name, then you should read about (but not listen to) Lady Antebellum, a pop country band who recently changed their name to "Lady A." The only problem is that there was already a black female blues singer who went by that name, and she was rightly perturbed that Lady Antebellum was going to all but erase her from streaming services. Lady Antebellum responded by... suing Lady A. Fucking bloodsucking scumbags.

P.P.P.S. And finally, I tried to avoid in this review any type of hand-wringing narrative where I questioned whether I am really the intended audience for such an album. I understand how easily I could be perceived as the adulterer leaving tights on a boat. If the purpose of this album is to empower women, I hope that a straight white male listening to it and enjoying it isn't seen as a failure on the Chicks' part, but rather a personal attempt on this listener's part at humility, and an acknowledgment that yes, sometimes I am part of the problem, and that I want the Chicks to remind me of this. Anyways, sorry for even bringing this up. I just fear that someone who needs to hear this album is going to avoid it if Joe K*** give it a positive review.