Jewel is revisiting one of the crucial surreal and harmful chapters of her early profession — a real-life encounter with Mexican police throughout a drug bust that might later encourage one in all her most enduring songs.
Talking throughout her Not Alone Summit at Wynn Las Vegas in November, the singer, who has reached the highest 10 on the Billboard 200 with six albums, mirrored on the expertise in an unique interview with PEOPLE, which first reported the story completely.
In response to Jewel, the incident happened in the summertime of 1994, when she was 20 years previous and touring via Mexico with longtime collaborator Steve Poltz throughout a break from writing music.
What started as a quiet songwriting retreat rapidly escalated into one thing much more perilous. Whereas spending time on a distant seashore in Baja California, Jewel and Poltz had been approached by armed males in uniform figuring out themselves as Mexican federal police.
After casually asking if the officers knew the place they may go whale watching, the pair had been invited onto a small boat — solely to be taught mid-trip that the officers had been in the midst of an lively drug bust.
“They stated, ‘We’re on a drug bust,’” Jewel recalled. When she requested if the state of affairs was harmful, she stated the officer responded merely: “Sí.”
The singer later realized that the wood bench she was sitting on doubled as storage for automated weapons. Because the boat chased a fleeing vessel that refused to establish itself, Jewel stated she watched officers pursue suspects, uncovering massive portions of marijuana hidden underneath rocks alongside the shoreline.
Regardless of the gravity of the state of affairs, Jewel recalled moments of disbelief and darkish humor, together with fears that she and Poltz may very well be framed or imprisoned.
“I used to be actually paranoid we had been gonna find yourself in a Tijuana jail,” she stated.
Pictures from the incident — together with one exhibiting Jewel holding a rifle alongside officers — later circulated on-line, changing into a chunk of ’90s music lore.
Within the aftermath, Jewel and Poltz remained in Mexico briefly, persevering with to jot down music. One of many songs born from that interval would develop into “You Had been Meant for Me,” launched in 1995 on her debut album Items of You.
