I’ll make this brief, as I am on somewhat of a tight schedule today, but it is something I just couldn’t ignore. I have come to the conclusion that Jewel is not particularly good at anything she does.

Let’s rewind to about ’96 when this Eskimo chick debuted. She had her little guitar, trying to convey the image of the “young but thoughtful prodigette with a pseudo-Dylan folk feel.” Yeah, yeah, all that’s well and good and the album wasn’t bad for what it was. But she wasn’t really anything special. C’mon, let’s be honest here.

Then it was her book of *ahem* poetry, in which she tried to come off like the “pensive young jack-of-all-trades with a Jim Morrison flare for writing sans the morbid undertones.” Needless to say her book was panned and completely torn apart. Why? Because it was bad. See, and no one wants to read bad stuff. Except for Danielle Steele enthusiasts. Moving along…

Then just a couple years ago she tried to swim headfirst into the mainstream with her second album in which it was time for the “thoughtful but fun-loving, care-free folk-rock-pop singer/songwriter.” It’s just a pity that Sheryl Crow beat her to the punch nearly ten years earlier, and Michelle Branch perfected the technique that same year. This poor Alaskan just can’t get it right.

And just this year, Jewel has further tarnished her name by regressing even further into a full-blown pop tart a la Britney Christina Moore Simpson. You get the idea. Dancing around half-naked to recycled pop beats while getting washed down with a fire hose. Now her purpose in making this video was to “address the commercialism of society.”

Y’know, Neil Young did that back in ’89 with his video for “This Note’s For You,” and he didn’t have to dance like the New Kids to do it. He did it the only way he knew how: by sticking to his guns and offering biting lyrics that chewed away at the phony shell of MTV, Pepsi, Budweiser and your mom. If Jewel is trying to do the same, then she’s being completely counterproductive by altering her musical style from a more rootsy element to the overblown pomposity of pop music. I suppose it could be thought of as “fighting fire with fire,” but I’d think it’s more sensible to douse the blaze than to make it bigger. And again, she can’t even get this genre right.

I guess what I’m saying is, Jewel, you’re not good for much, except maybe serving as decent eye candy from the mouth down. Get some of those invisible braces and hole up in the igloo for a few months until they straighten out that snaggletooth.

Goodnight, and have a pleasant tomorrow.