Jewel Turned Down $1 Million Record Deal When She Was Homeless

But you're going to experience but again that goes back to like you have an excuse all the time to do the wrong thing You have an excuse all the time to go back to the familiar You have an excuse all the time why to say the whole world is against you and be right But so what now what now what are you gonna do about it? How happy do you want to be your life will rise to the level you settle for and just to keep pushing? What did you do how did you get out of it like how did you what was the first job that you got? When I was homeless, yeah Hi, I started because I grew up singing I was like maybe I could get a gig somewhere and start singing cuz I made money singing You know like for my whole life since I was little like 100 bucks 200 bucks, but whatever So I'd go around a coffee shops in the area, but San Diego started to be a hotbed for signing activity You know grunge there was a kind of a grunge scene in San Diego And so I'd go in there and they they charged you to sing there I was like this is not ideal like they wanted me to pay them $200. I was like, yeah I was like, this is the one gig. Yeah, and it was the idea that you would sell tickets They thought it was no they thought it was like a signing you would get signed Oh, you know what I mean because it became like so many record labels. I guess we're coming down at the time. I Remember this one lady like my friend let me sit in on his gig So I go sing with him. I'm starting to write my own songs Oh, I forgot to tell you how I started writing songs back at school, but I'll tell you later So he started writing songs Singing my own stuff I get on my friend's gig. He's packed the place out. I don't clearly but he has it crowded There's like a door charge So I go to settle out while he's taking his gear down and this woman coffee shop owner was like you guys don't get the door money most like What are you talking about like he brought all these people in she's like no she goes you get the tip jar and I was like, oh I was like, you know what then why don't we get all your coffee and food money? You could just give us that instead And she was like you don't get the food beverage money you get the tip jar and I was so upset I needed the money so badly like I didn't have food You know like I was I was really wanting some money from that gig And I remember I put my little finger in her face and I was like I am cursing you Whoa, you I know it's so heavy I was like you are stealing from the people that are giving you a living You're stealing from this guy and I was like you are you will go out of business I was like nobody can stay in business doing this to humans. I was so upset at her and I did he have a Understanding with her or was he's here. He just didn't care. I was so in hippies blown away I was like He just wanted to be easy going and didn't want to make her mad and wanted to get another gig there And I was just so upset and so I found this place. I liked this little when I was living in my car There was a little tree that was flowering tree and I like to park next to it So like that was my home and I noticed there was this coffee shop right there that was going out of business And it was really off the beaten path And so I went in there and I talked to the lady who owned it. Her name was Nancy And I was like do you think you could stay open for two more months and she's like why I'm like if I bring people in can I keep the door money you can keep all the coffee and food and Like we'll try and make it together and she said yes and so I started going down on like the beach front in San Diego and I'd sing like Street sing and I'd tell people I'm singing at the interchange coffee shop on Thursday night at 6 o'clock and two people came like it was two surfers that thought I was hot I think And I did a five-hour show because bar singing you do five-hour shows And I just thought I had to do a five-hour show so I started writing a ton of material Plus I was using writing not to steal and I was a prolific thief so I had to become a prolific writer And so I did this five-hour show to these two guys I'm bleeding my heart out because I was so lonely and I realized I never tell the truth like nobody knows the truth I'm scared to death. I'm not a great person. I'm stealing and I'm lonely and I was like maybe if I tell the truth I won't feel so lonely So I made a promise that I would write really honest songs so these poor two surfers were subjected to five hours like bleeding out my vocal cords It was amazing I made ten dollars and The next night and I would go sing all throughout town street corner I'd say hey Thursday night They knew where to see me and it just grew it went from two people to four people to eight people To 40 to 80 to capacity to people standing outside watching me sing through the window and I got discovered Yeah, it was nuts. Wow Yeah, that's a great story Wow What was that like? What was it was the feeling like when it was at capacity and you recognized that these people were that? Something was changing in your life. These people were coming out to see you perform The coolest thing and why I'm smiling is because I was changing it. It moves me to tears right now Even before the people came I felt a momentum shifting, you know, I just felt I Was getting better I was getting healthier I was getting happier my panic attacks like I found out how not to have them Like it just made me feel good. And then when these people came I just bore my soul and I just didn't pull a punch and they They liked me and I know that sounds superficial, but it wasn't because it was so authentically me I wasn't pretending to be better or more talented. It was so raw and People would cry and I would cry and it was just such a real connection like for the first time in my life I had a real meaningful human connection and it wasn't scary it felt good and They would give me books to read and they would give me food And I didn't think it would lead to a record deal It just felt like being fed for the first time in your life, you know Not hiding and not being fake and just being really authentic So it felt really good and then when more people came it just took on a momentum that was like holy How much time is passed from the two people to people standing outside? You know, I don't know but six months maybe ish something like that That's a lot of change in six months Yeah, maybe a little more eight months, but couldn't have been more than that cuz I don't think I was homeless more than a year Was that that change how to feel crazy? It was wild It was cool and you know from like being on stage but like I wouldn't make a set list and I would just feel the audience and like I talked I did a lot of I Tell a lot of stories and like kind of like stand up. I would just tell it like just stories and jokes and just shoot shit with people in the audience and they were just these really live electric like kind of wild shows and Make them dead quiet and I would just take a little break so people could use the bathroom and and When people started standing outside and they couldn't hear but they were just watching me through the window and the look on their face Like to this day it like gives me chills like they looked at me with like a certain look and it was like holy shit like this is different and They would stand out in the rain like we put little speakers out there so they could hear and people would stand in the rain and just listen to me singing through The window with little speakers and it was just like it was very humbling like very very humbling Wow. Yeah So then what happens? How do you get discovered? There was a radio DJ programmer, excuse me He ran 91X which is a really big radio station in the country They might have been number two in the country at the time heavy alternative station somebody told him about this girl singing in a coffee shop and that he should come and He came and I could recognize new faces when they come in because it was if this wasn't a big place by the way I mean, this might have been 70 people that could fit inside. That's a tiny coffee So you had developed a crowd like you were accustomed to seeing familiar foot faces. Yeah, it was a loyal die-hard Die-hard fan base like tiny don't get me wrong But I knew them, you know what I mean? It was it was like a little family in a way and so this guy came and he had a goatee slung shirt on He looked kind of hard and he was sitting in the back and I remember singing the song a thousand miles away And he was just weeping like quietly, but just tears were streaming down his face And he came up to me afterwards. He's like hey, I'm at the radio station and like why don't you come in like sing a song? One night or something? I was like, okay So I go in there Still living in I'm oh, I got another car. So I had a car to live in I'd saved up enough door money to buy a car cheap car like a $100 car and So I get down to the radio station and I sing a song for him and we talked a little bit and I Guess he went ahead him and this guy named Lou Niles put it On the radio and it got requested by fans That's back when you could still request songs and they'd listen to it and it got somehow into the top 20 You know of this station Which is a big deal like top 20 on that station was like, you know Labels pay a lot of money to promote their artists to train get them into the top 20 and this was like an acoustic guitar demo in the middle of like all this grunge music and so record labels were like How that what is this song that's showing up on this playlist and they would call him and he's like it's this chick down at this coffee shop and so all of a sudden there'd be like these limousines pulling up and They would give sweet little Nancy, you know, it was just she was having a banging business now, which felt so good and They would be like she'd like julsony records here tonight. All right. I was so passe about the whole thing. It was very funny and then they'd take me out to tacos and Talk to me about record deals and and then there was a bidding war. It was every label came down every label They've flown from New York. They'd bring in bigger executives then they'd fly in they'd come again they'd you know all these limousines showing up and I would start to got flown around to talk to different record labels and This process take I don't know I'm kind of bad with time that way. I don't know a couple months something like that and you don't have a manager You don't have anybody speaking for you. Mm-hmm No, but I went to the library and I found this book How to manage yourself fight for dummies It Was Don Passenheim, I think called everything you need to know about the music business Oh boy, and that sounded good So I read it and I just learned about mechanicals and royalties and back ends and advances. Oh She did your homework. I did my homework and there ended up being a huge bidding war over me All the labels just started like competing by this time. I kind of found like a de facto manager I Maybe got a lawyer here at some point, you know, and this might now have taken more time But I realized because of reading that book that an advance is a loan. You don't get to keep the money You pay it back through record sales and so I did the math to see how many records it have to sell to pay back a million dollars and it was a lot of records and So it was like having a bounty on my head as an artist I almost didn't sign my record deal because I had just figured out how to be happy Genuinely I was really starting to figure it out and I knew it like inside myself. I was doing so much better and God forbid you take somebody with my emotional background and they ever get famous I'm the recipe for every movie you've seen about every musician like And again, I didn't want to be a statistic and I fought so hard for my happiness up to this point that I was like I don't think I could trust myself to have a record deal and Figure out how to do that career without self imploding. So I almost didn't sign it. I remember being on the beach one day and I was like I Wanted to do it, but I was terrified of doing it So I made myself a promise that my number one job would still be to figure out how to be happy And my number two job would be to be a musician and then under the musician category That I wanted to be an artist more than I wanted to be famous and so knowing those was like having my North Star and I felt like I could navigate and make decisions based on those things and So I went ahead and signed the record deal. I turned down the advance. I turned down a million dollar bonus as homeless kid And I took the biggest do that that's I would have taken that money for sure a hundred percent I don't know why I'll figure it out in the future Taking this money. I'm getting a fucking fat apartment overlooking the water Who's not what I did as a homeless kid you passed on a million bucks I did But I took the biggest back end anybody had ever been awarded and so if I sold records I was gonna make a shit ton So because like under the artist category I wanted to be an artist more than I wanted to be famous It meant I had to put myself in an environment and in a position to win as a singer-songwriter and as a folk singer No less at the height of grunge The odds of that working I knew were really slim and I felt like the bidding war over me was just much more of like a dick Contest between all the labels. I didn't think it necessarily had to do with my talent I thought it was talented, but I thought the odds were still really really against me and I had to put myself in a position to be able to Whether The fact that my first album may not be successful But if you have a million dollar signing bonus You have to have your first let record be successful or else you'll get dropped because you cost so much the label and So I was just doing it to put myself in a position to make my art first and to not leverage my art Unduly, you know, it's like saying you have to grow a pair, but you don't even have a tree yet Like I had to grow a tree like the pair was a long way away And so I just tried to look at it kind of Agriculture earlier in a natural system of like I have to grow I have to plant a seed I have to like grow a tree You know watch the entire episode for free only on Spotify