Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today to talk about a band. On the surface, this is a simple story of three Texas gals — a fiddler, a strings player, and a singer — who found each other and started making music. They released four albums, toured the world, ran into some hot water with their conservative fans by expressing uncomfortable truths, took some time off to make babies and marriages and lives outside a tour bus. And then, one day in November 2015, they made an announcement to the world. They were back. And we promptly lost our goddamn minds.

Because, you see, the Dixie Chicks are so much more than a band. They were our teachers and therapists and cool big sisters, providing the soundtrack to our childhoods and teaching us about love and loss and confidence and humility. They taught us what it meant to be a woman, and to be a Southern woman: how to stand your ground and fight for what you believe in, that it means to embrace your heritage and make it your own, that being vulnerable is not the same thing as being weak. Their songs are embedded in our bones, woven into the very fabric of our souls. There are certain bands that come along at crucial points in your life, that speak to the very heart of you and never let go. That is what the Dixie Chicks are to us. They are home.

We knew, the second they announced they were heading back out on the road again, that we needed to be there. Luckily, Scout’s momma agreed, and so come June 13th we will be in Madison Square Garden with her and our bestie Katie to soak it all up (Zelda, truly blessed, is actually seeing them TWICE, first with her family on June 1st. Scout doesn’t want to talk about it.). And as we count down the days until that fateful night, we’re reacquainting ourselves with the canon, greeting familiar songs like old friends. These are some of our favorites, in the order in which they entered our lives (this was in the time before shuffle, y’all, when we would buy the physical CDs and stick them in our boomboxes, letting them unfold like a magical, musical story). This is the story of how three gals shaped two gals, and helped bring them together as friends. We hope you love them as much as we do.

As always, you can listen along here, or we’re on YouTube and Spotify.