JUST IN: Founding Dixie Chicks Member Killed In Texas Car Crash

Laura Lynch, a founding member of the Dixie Chicks, was killed Saturday as a result of a head-on car crash in Texas.

The 64-year-old was killed instantly after another car slammed into her vehicle as it was trying to pass on a highway outside of El Paso, according to a report from TMZ. The driver of the other vehicle was transported to an area hospital with non-life-threatening injuries while Lynch was pronounced dead at the scene.

Lynch co-founded The Dixie Chicks alongside Robin Lynn Macy, Martie Erwin and Emily Erwinin 1990. She went on to record three albums with the group before departing in 1993.

She primarily played the bass for the wildly popular country music group before serving as the band’s lead vocalist for their third album, Shouldn’t a Told You That. She was ultimately replaced by Natalie Maines in 1995.

Lynch lived a largely private life after her retirement from the band. Lynch purportedly spent her free time “learning to oil paint” and had no regrets about leaving the Dixie Chicks after suffering from exhaustion, according to a report from the New York Post.

She did have fond memories of her time with the group, saying “I’d get anemic all over again to do it.

Following Lynch’s departure, the band went on to release the wildly successful “Wide Open Spaces” in 1998. The group then released two more successful albums, Fly in 1998 and Home in 2002, each of which sold millions of copies.

In more recent years, the band generated controversy when Maines spoke out against the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, adding that she was “ashamed” that George W. Bush hailed from her home state of Texas. The group also rebranded to “The Chicks” amidst the Black Lives Matter riots in 2020.