The 2023-24 winter has been tough for country music fans. Dixie Chicks co-founder Laura Lynch passed away just before Christmas, and February saw the death of another country music icon, Toby Keith. The wake of his passing has dredged up a long dormant feud between the longtime performers, even though it was put to rest more than 20 years ago.
What was the fight between the Chicks and Toby Keith about?
Back in 2003, tensions were high surrounding the impending Iraq war. Long before The Chicks frontwoman Natalie Maines made her own controversial statements regarding the invasion of Iraq, Keith released “Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue (The Angry American).” The song, inspired by the September 11 attacks on America, was laced with anger and emphasized America’s fighting fury. One line in particular, “Cause we’ll put a boot in your ass/ It’s the American way” drew criticism from more liberal listeners.
A vocal opponent of then-President Bush and the war on Iraq, Maines disliked the lyrics and called them ignorant, saying, “it makes country music sound ignorant. It targets an entire culture — and not just the bad people who did bad things. You’ve got to have some tact.”
Keith took umbrage with her response, calling her a “big mouth” for her comments. He began displaying fake images of Maines alongside images of Saddam Hussain at his concerts. In turn, Maines wore a homemade t-shirt with the acronym “F.U.T.K.” emblazoned on it. Though the women initially claimed the letters stood for “Friend United in Truth and Kindness,” Maines eventually came clean in the band’s documentary, Shut Up and Sing that the letters did in fact refer to Toby Keith.
In March of 2003, The Chicks were all but exiled from the country music scene after Maines told British audiences, “Just so you know, we’re on the good side with y’all. We do not want this war, this violence, and we’re ashamed that the President of the United States is from Texas.” The controversy surrounding the statement followed The Chicks for years, but the band stood by their comments.
Toby Keith ends the feud
While the band struggled with a near industry wide blackout of their music, Toby Keith had his own moment of reckoning. In August of that year, Keith ended the spat after news that a good friend of his had a young daughter who was dying of cancer. When Keith heard the news that the 2-year-old wasn’t long for this world, it made him take stock of his life. He told Contactmusic,
“I saw a picture on the cover of Country Weekly with a picture of me and Natalie and it said, ‘Fight to the Death’ or something. It seemed so insignificant. I said, ‘Enough is enough.’” He went on to say that he never started the spat, “They started it with me; they came out and just tore me up.”
Toby Keith lost his own fight with stomach cancer after a 6-month battle with the disease.