Best National Country Act

Dixie Chicks

Dixie Chicks' "Wide Open Spaces" (Monument Sony) has now spent 66 weeks on Billboard's top 100. Pretty impressive stats for a band who, last September, were given the Country Music Association's Horizon award for "Best Newcomer." In reality, the Dixie Chicks are seasoned pros, having spent a good part of the late '80s playing for tips on Dallas street corners. Back then, they were an "All Cowgirl Band" wearing Western outfits and playing more traditional bluegrass, country, and Western swing. Original members (and sisters) Martie Seidel and Emily Erwin are superb musicians. In 1987, Seidel won second place at the national Old Time Fiddlers Convention, while Erwin was perfecting her banjo style (while also playing a number of acoustic instruments like the violin, Dobro, and mandolin). Their first album, Thank Heavens for Dale Evans, featured four fresh-faced women raring to take bluegrass and country music by storm. Ten years later, they've done just that, but not without an image change. Led by relative newcomer Natalie Maines, they still play their own instruments. But today's pop country music prizes the pretty face, leading some to unfairly call them the Spice Girls of country. If only they'd open those instrument cases a little more often, the casual viewer might be surprised to find out just how good they are.

-- David Ritchie