"I don't think cynicism's smarter, it's just safer," declares a
characteristically defiant Jewel, on the subject of the raw, heartfelt songs
that grace her debut LP, 'Pieces of You'. And she can afford to be smug.
Two of those songs, the uplifting 'Who Will Save Your Soul?' and the tender
'You Were Made for Me' have recently shot their way into the US Top Ten. She's
currently on the cover of Rolling Stone. She's been feted by the likes of
Neil Young and Bob Dylan (who let her tweak his nose),and even Smokin' Bill
Clinton had her round for a bit of a campfire singalong at one of his
inaugural balls. Things are clearly on the up for the 23-year-old
singer-songwriter who was, not so long ago, eking a demoralising living
waiting tables in San Diego and living on carrots and peanut butter in the
back of her van. Is the smell of success sweet?
"Even half-an-hour of a bad show is better than three hours of waitressing,"
she grimaces. "But yeah, it's fun to see all the people kiss my butt that
said my records would be played on the radio over their dead bodies."
The downright folky 'Who Will Save Your Soul?' was, frankly, never going to
be an obvious candidate for the higher reaches of chartdom. With its
countrified, rootsical melodies and its heartfelt plea for more substance
in life, it recalls nothing so much as a post-slacker 'Talkin' 'Bout A
Revolution' by Tracy Chapman (ask your elder sister).
But after two-and-a-half years of hard touring - consisting of "opening up
for punk and goth bands and playing tiny clubs and hating life; doing 40
cities every 30 days and driving myself everywhere in a rental car" - Jewel's
reward has come in the shape of four million album sales, and a devoted
fanbase coast to coast. For someone whose most dearly-held personal value is
sincerity and who was brought up a free spirit in rural Alaska, how does she
feel about her new-found media-babe mega-fame?
"I'm not real comfortable with it," she sighs, with the pained air of a lo-fi
shrinking violet. "But a friend of mine who is a movie actor said it was an
adjustment well worth making."
Ah. That'll be Sean Penn, with whom Jewel has had a much-publicised affair.
But enough scurrilous tongue-wagging; what about the none-less-rock poems
that litter the album sleeve? (One is called 'Las Vegas', and it's great:
"Women who suck/Their cigarettes/As though they were/Giving their/Hatred
head".) Why are these tacked on as an afterthought?
A torrent of sincerity wells up: "It was more out of humility than an
afterthought. I've always been such an accidental writer. I never thought I
was a songwriter. I never thought I was a poet. Bukowski's a poet! Jesus, I'm
a kid living in a car! I thought putting out a book of poetry was
pretentious!" she laughs, not unreasonably. "But, er, I do plan to collect
them all into a book now."
Like the man said, it's an adjustment well worth making.
Kitty Empire
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