Jewel’s new album Picking Up the Pieces is receiving its worldwide debut Friday, but the album is available now for preview on Pandora, offering fans a first look at the album critics are calling “remarkably raw” and “bracingly honest” (Entertainment Weekly) ahead of its Sept. 11 release.
The album is a personal return to her roots as a folk- and country-influenced singer-songwriter. The New York Times’ Best Selling author and poet also will be sharing her story through her new Blue Rider Press memoir, Never Broken: Songs Are Only Half the Story, due Sept. 15. The raw look at her struggles, even at the peak of her career, led Loretta Lynn to write, “Jewel’s Life in ‘Never Broken’ reminded me so much of my own. But if we hadn’t of come from hardship and nothing, we wouldn’t have made something out of ourselves.”
Jewel will celebrate the releases with a number of television appearances and book signings in the coming weeks. She’ll visit FOX News’ Fox & Friends on Sept. 14, ABC’s The View on Sept. 15, ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel Live on Oct. 1 and Steve Harvey on Oct. 22. Additionally, Jewel will make appearances on TheHoward Stern Show on Sept. 21 and NPR’s My Big Break On Point with Tom Ashbrook, and Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me throughout September and October. Book signings begin Sept. 14 in New York and will include stops in Nashville, Boston, Denver, Phoenix and Los Angeles. She’s also appearing at this year’s AmericanaFest during the Americana Music Festival and Conference on Sept. 15 in Nashville.
Jewel’s 1995 release Pieces of You, recorded by Ben Keith’s home studio, should be considered a cornerstone of the current Americana and folk movements. The raw look at life on the edge buoyed by the hit “Who Will Save Your Soul” sold more than 12 million copies, but as Jewel chronicles in “Never Broken,” the time was far from happy. Picking Up the Pieces also covers difficult territory, and critics are responding.
“When the time came to make a new album, she wanted to get back to the vibe she captured on her debut and close the loop on Pieces of You with a bookend called Picking Up The Pieces writes. “The result is a remarkably raw, bracingly honest set of folk and Americana tunes that tap into both the remarkable spirit in her voice and her incredible lyrical honesty.”
Rhapsody’s review notes “Jewel proves she is the sum of her parts: Picking Up the Pieces lightly treads in the country terrain she fully explored on her last two albums, while returning to the folk-pop poetry of her Pieces of You debut…”
Picking Up the Pieces is Jewel’s first new adult-oriented album of studio material in five years. Keith has passed away, so Jewel took over production of the album herself, hiring a band comprised mostly of Young collaborators. The album comes after a difficult period that included her divorce and the birth of her first child. Picking Up the Pieces captures some of these moments on “Love Used to Be” and “Mercy,” and also gathers longtime unrecorded live favorites like “Carnivore” and “Boy Needs a Bike.” The album includes “My Father’s Daughter,” a stunning autobiographical collaboration with Dolly Parton.
For more information about Jewel, Picking Up the Pieces and tour dates, check in at www.JewelJK.com. And follow @jeweljk on Twitter.
About Jewel
Spending the past several years alternating between penning her memoir, Never Broken, and recording a pair of children’s albums, Jewel is set to return with her first proper album of new music since 2010’s Sweet and Wild. Picking Up The Pieces, which serves as a “bookend” to the Alaskan-born singer’s landmark, multi-platinum-selling debut, 1995’s Pieces Of You, is some of Jewel’s most striking work yet: front and center is the iconic singer-songwriter’s world-renowned vocals, laser-sharp songcraft and intricate guitarwork. “It was time in my life to do this,” Jewel, who Rolling Stone calls “one of the most richly idiomatic pop singers of her generation,” explains of the 14-track LP, recorded in Nashville with seasoned musicians, and featuring road-tested fan favorites (“Carnivore,” “Boy Needs A Bike”) alongside groundbreaking new tracks (“Love Used To Be”) and a stunning collaboration with country legend Dolly Parton (“My Father’s Daughter”). Says Jewel: “I wanted the album to be purely an extension of my soul.”
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