I think it’s fair to say Jewel has been through a lot in the past few years. Her last album of original studio material was in 2010 with ‘Sweet and Wild’, and since that time she’s released a holiday album and two children’s offerings, but nothing that chronicles the birth of her son, the breakdown of her marriage and the life shifts that occurred in between. This is all changed with today’s release of ‘Picking Up The Pieces’, a bookend of sorts to her celebrated debut ‘Pieces of You’, which put her on the map with her raw, honest songwriting and folksy approach. Featuring fourteen tracks, some of which are old live favorites that extend back through the 90s, and some of which that are brand new for this record, it’s a cohesive collection of critical, razor-sharp reflections on life, family, conflict, love, pain, regret, doubt and ultimately peace, even if that peace is somewhat cracking in places.
Many of the heavy emotions on this record can easily be attributed to Jewel’s comparatively recent divorce, although it is the poetic license of the songwriter to put out material that fools us in its inspiration. It is reductive to assume that every song here holds reference to her break-up, particularly due to the age of the some of the offerings, but equally it is hard to ignore the freshness of the pain, the strike of the match as she sends herself up in flames. It can be difficult to listen to at times; ‘His Pleasure Is My Pain’ is an especially emotive piece, supported by sitar and cello and alternating between impassioned, broken singing and almost vicious spoken word. Jewel takes the concept of blunt honesty to a new level here, making sure we feel every word with every ounce of meaning and emotion she has experienced, striking us at our most vulnerable and painting a clear picture of her truth. “I wonder if he’s only half alive or if he’s always lacked such subtlety,” she says, the words rolling around her tongue with a kind of twisted delight, interspersed with the more desperate cries of “Yes it’s true I’m too sensitive but he takes pleasure in my pain.”
In case it wasn’t already blindingly clear, this is not a record for the faint of heart. We find her stripped away and open at her most broken, her most devastated, her most angry and bitter. The powerful opener ‘Love Used To Be’ reflects on all the different aspects of her life love used to fulfil, and how it has impacted those now it is gone. “Dig a six foot hole inside my chest,” she begs, before building to a half-sung yell as the heartbreak becomes too much. Equally ‘The Shape of You’ finds Jewel lost, missing someone so painfully and deeply that it becomes all she can hold onto, while ‘Carnivore’ (an old song, repurposed with new relevancy) lashes out with fire-spitting anger, “Never trust your pink fleshy heart to a carnivore.” Instead of writing songs in hindsight of a great heartbreak, finding some kind of lesser representation of pain to convey in a way that is a more palatable to a mass audience, Jewel closes her eyes and just speaks her emotions, redefining what it is to be raw in this industry.
The closing track ‘Mercy’ has this same concept in mind, “Simplicity does not come easy when you’re dreaming of being someone else,” she advises, and this willingness to let go of the veneers and the walls she has built up over the course of a career is what informs this record the most. It is so easy to think we are being raw and truthful when in actual fact it’s just a less guarded version of ourselves – ‘Picking Up The Pieces’ looks to discard that in favor of simplicity and honesty in their essences. Just a record about stories and feelings and experiences. ‘A Boy Needs A Bike’, another old song that many fans will be familiar with, sees Jewel taking on the perspective of a little boy whose parents’ marriage is complicated. He doesn’t understand why his father doesn’t just take him and his sister and drive away from the conflict, though his father assures him it’s not as simple as that. Through the innocence of a child, we see two people who shouldn’t be together and how their imperfect relationship impacts their children, but we also see that we can get caught up in the rules and social practises of the world that prevent us from doing what we should.
The same message crawls through the curiously rhythmic take-down ‘Plain Jane’, which lambasts a person for trying too hard to be interesting and socially dominant, instead advising that she prefers this person as a plain jane. But Jewel experiences her own communication breakdown on ‘It Doesn’t Hurt Right Now’, a wonderful duet with Rodney Crowell, not afraid to showcase the ugly side of relationship conflict.
There are a couple of songs regarding family on this record, and Jewel looks to take the lessons she’s learned into motherhood on ‘Family Tree’, a reflection on the mistakes and twisted legacy of her ancestors and those already made between her and her ex-husband. The other duet on this album, ‘My Father’s Daughter’, finds Dolly Parton joining the songstress in a perfectly-suited country folk track that takes a kinder approach to the influence of family.
‘Picking Up The Pieces’ is at times a hard listen and pushes us to the edge of our emotional boundaries. But there is resolution and comfort in there – not falsified, but reminding us the pain won’t always hurt this much, even though right now we’re screaming and crying and bleeding inside. It’s a time capsule, like ‘Pieces of You’ was, that reflects an emotional journey for Jewel, and I’m glad she took us along for the ride. Life is ugly, but it’s a little less so if we all stop pretending to be doing better than we are.
Originally posted here.
