The Chicks had wanted to drop Dixie from their name for several years.

The country group recently announced they were to be known by the shortened moniker in response to the killing of George Floyd at the hands of police, but the trio - singer Natalie Maines and siblings Martie Maguire and Emily Strayer - admitted the move had been a long time coming as they weren't all thrilled by their name at the start of their career and they more seriously considered a change following the backlash they experienced over their comments about then-US President George W. Bush in 2003.

Natalie said: ''The other girls never liked the name. When I joined, we discussed changing it but I thought it was the best thing about them . . .  'Nooo, Dixie Chicks is great!' I said.

''But after the Bush controversy, I wanted to change it too because I felt people had misunderstood who we were as people.

''Once this racist connotation dawned on me, it felt icky and I didn't like it. I mean, none of us did!''

The ''point of no return'' for the trio came when NASCAR banned the Confederate flag - which represented the Southern states below the Mason-Dixon Line during the American Civil War - from their events following the wave of Black Lives Matter protests sparked by George's death.

Natalie added to The Sun newspaper: ''We tried calling ourselves DCX and we always referred to ourselves as the Chicks but for me the point of no return, 'Oh my gosh we're doing this', came when NASCAR banned the Dixie flag.

''Could we really defend the word Dixie? No, we had to lose it.

''Though there wasn't any racist intention behind our name, it came from a historically hateful and negative place.''

And Emily insisted it was ''important'' for them to take a stand.

She said: ''It's such an important time to show solidarity with what's going on and the long overdue changes. Being from Texas we don't really consider ourselves Dixie anyway.

Martie added: ''I remember interviewers asking how we felt about calling ourselves 'chicks' and whether it was degrading to women.

''Dixie was never brought up as the troublesome part of our name but George Floyd's murder makes me emotional just thinking about it.

''When the pot boils over, how could we hold on to a name that represents so much pain for so many people? There was no choice and we are so relieved -- relieved is the word!''