Music Review

DIXIE CHICKS

At Xfinity Center, Mansfield, June 14

MANSFIELD — A lot can change in a decade, from prevailing musical trends to the party affiliation of the nation’s leader. The Dixie Chicks at the height of their popularity epitomized mainstream country-music success, with chart-topping singles and best-selling albums. Then in 2003, nine days before the US invaded Iraq, Natalie Maines, lead vocalist of the Texas trio, told a London audience, “We do not want this war, this violence, and we’re ashamed that the president of the United States is from Texas.’’

The country-music industry turned on the group, banishing it from the airwaves even as its 2006 LP, “Taking the Long Way,’’ went on to sweep up five Grammy Awards. The trio laid low, concentrating on raising families. Maines cut a solo record, while her bandmates, founding Chicks Emily Robison and Martie Maguire, toured and recorded as Court Yard Hounds.

When the reunited Dixie Chicks came to the Xfinity Center in Mansfield on Tuesday, you sensed even before they took the stage that no one was walking anything back. In the concession area, volunteers registered voters; in the theater you saw public service announcements for Human Rights Campaign and Proclaim Justice projected on screens alongside Dixie Chicks trivia questions and Maines’s snarky tweets.

Dressed in black-and-white, playing on a black-and-white stage, the Chicks and their five stellar supporting musicians opened with the title track from “The Long Way Around’’ and devoted a healthy portion of their show to that album’s songs. This also being a chance to get reacquainted, the show’s two generous sets included big gulps of favorites: “Goodbye Earl,’’ “Cowboy Take Me Away,’’ “Sin Wagon,’’ “Wide Open Spaces,’’ familiar covers of Bob Dylan’s “Mississippi’’ and Fleetwood Mac’s “Landslide,’’ most sparking joyous singalongs.

Still, there was plenty to make clear that the Chicks didn’t stop paying attention while they were away. Prince’s recording of “Let’s Go Crazy’’ having set the stage for the concert literally, an impassioned cover of his “Nothing Compares 2 U’’ provided one of the show’s early highlights.

Later, after a video interlude in which the Chicks waged a post-apocalyptic car chase over a twanged-up cover of Motörhead’s “Ace of Spades,’’ an intimate acoustic set sandwiched “Daddy Lessons,’’ from Beyoncé’s “Lemonade,’’ between Chicks staples “Travelin’ Soldier’’ and “White Trash Wedding.’’ In the bluegrass romp that followed, you could just make out the chorus of the Weeknd’s “Can’t Feel My Face’’ over what sounded like a chord progression from the White Stripes’ “Seven Nation Army.’’

Maybe you caught the Beyoncé T-shirt Maines was wearing under her jacket for the first half of the concert, or the stylized version of Miley Cyrus’s leer that replaced it — more signifiers that the Chicks hadn’t lost touch.

Really, they didn’t have to try so hard. A lot can change in a decade, but this show made clear the Dixie Chicks essentials — Maines’s appealing voice and punky charisma; the way the gifted Robison and Maguire ground her brash energy, rooting her deftly and sympathetically — remain intact. And to judge by audience response to some of the evening’s more pointed inclusions — a defaced snapshot of Donald Trump onscreen during “Goodbye Earl’’; the chaotic political circus that accompanied “Ready to Run’’ (including President George W. Bush added to Mount Rushmore); the inclusive sentiment proclaimed before an evening-closing cover of Ben Harper’s “Better Way’’ — the band has mounted its comeback at exactly the right moment.

DIXIE CHICKS

At Xfinity Center, Mansfield, June 14

Steve Smith can be reached at steven.smith@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @nightafternight.