In the midst of an afternoon of doing interviews via telephone from her Stephenville, TX, ranch, Jewel [ tickets ] is starving. Ever polite, she apologizes for munching on pork rinds in a reporter's ear.

"I'm starving so I thought I would eat pork rinds real quick. I'm really sorry," the Alaska-bred singer says.

Jewel is promoting her sixth solo album, "Goodbye Alice in Wonderland," which hits stores May 2. The album's title refers to what she calls her "wild ride" of a life. On May 23, she begins a co-headlining tour with labelmate Rob Thomas.

"It's been a wild ride. I sequenced the album like a novel. If a fan really wants to listen to the record over and over again, they'll hear about me being raised in Alaska and butchering cattle, to living in San Diego, to being homeless, to becoming famous to the wild ride of the ultimate illusion of fame, to living on a ranch in Texas again," she said.

For "Goodbye Alice in Wonderland," she chose from a huge backlog of songs that she's written over the years.

"'Satellite' was written about the first time I went to Hollywood. '1,000 Miles Away' I wrote when I was 17. There's another song I wrote when I was 25. I probably had 500 songs in my catalog. That doesn't mean there's 500 good songs," she said with a laugh.

"I decide what kind of record I'm making and draw from some stuff that seems relative to that. That gives me the luxury of never having to feel pressure," she added.

LiveDaily talked with Jewel on two recent occasions--during a one-on-one phone call and during a teleconference with other journalists. She discussed her music, the meaning of "Goodbye Alice in Wonderland" and the importance of turning 30 years old.

liveDaily: Tell me a little bit about the album title and how your life parallels, I guess you could say, "Alice in Wonderland."

Jewel: "Goodbye Alice in Wonderland" refers to a willingness to let go of the fairy tales that we're told growing up--the fairy tales that we start to then tell ourselves, the lies that we start to tell ourselves, the little fictions we create--and a willingness to look at the truth. I don't consider myself Alice in Wonderland. Certainly, my life has been a fantastic ride, but I'm more talking about the little fantasies that we kid ourselves with. Like when we're children, we're told love is going to be great. Just fall in love, the rest will take care of itself. And then we fall in love and we realize, 'OK, this is actually really, really hard work. This guy doesn't just tell me I'm great every day,' you know? So, you either become disillusioned, because you want that fairy tale and you think real love is disappointing, or you find a way to find romance within the truth. You can find poetry in the struggle and enjoy it, and that's what the record is about on different themes. It deals with the fairy tales I've told myself, that I've been told, from fame to love to career to all sorts of things.

Teleconference: You're appearing on tour with Rob Thomas who, like you, is a great songwriter. Is there any chance that you guys are actually going to share the stage, do any kind of duet sort of thing?

Yes, I just e-mailed to him the other night that we need to work on a song together. One of my favorite things about singing live is that it's actually live music, so I was excited to tour with him because I think it will be a show that fans will like, because I do a different set list every night, and Rob is great live, and then we'll also sing together.

What brought you to finally record some songs that we've grown to love from your live performances, such as "1,000 Miles Away" and "Long Slow Slide?"

I'm so glad you know them. Well, there are some songs I've really loved. They've become underground favorites. I think they've been requested as much as any of the hits I've ever had, if not more. But, this was finally the record that it just seems like they really fit on. This record sort of chronicles my life. ... So, I was actually able to use some of the songs from those different periods in my life to explain those periods in my life in a way.

What did make this the right time, do you think, to not only just put out these songs, but to take this personal and very autobiographical course on an album?

To me, I really see this record as a bookend to my first record, "Pieces of You," and I think it's because it was a really similar time in my life in a completely different way, meaning that I was turning 20 during my first record. Those decade birthdays always kind of cause me, it seems, to reflect, look back, and then look forward. I just was closing this period of my life where I was living in a car and just scrambling my whole life, to now signing a six-record deal with Atlantic and looking forward to this crazy road that I was going to embark on. On this record, I was turning 30. I'm now at the end of that six-record deal. My life has changed so utterly, completely and thoroughly, and was able to come full circle and I lived my life in a way that I did in the beginning, where I live on a ranch and have a really simple life. I make records, I go out and promote them, and then I go back to my really simple, normal life.

If this is the end of your six-record deal, what are you doing next?

I'm not sure. I'll either re-sign and continue to make records for a major label, or I might also go out on my own and try and make my own records. I've never really found singing to be the most fun part of my job. That's why I stay out of the spotlight.

Any more poetry books in your future?

I did do a book of love poems I wrote just for Ty, but my boyfriend's mom lives at the ranch, and I've been afraid to publish it, because I don't want her to read it.

How do you feel about your career now compared to the mid and late '90s, when it was you and Sarah McLachlan and Alanis Morissette who were three female singer/songwriters who just were all over the radio?

Everything has cycles. I never expected the female "movement" to last very long. People do what serves them. Radio didn't play two women back-to-back for a long time. They barely did during the height of the female "movement," but it wasn't because they liked us or because they cared about females. It's because it was helping them sell, and they were able to get advertising for it. I never took it personally, is what I'm getting at. I never expected it to last, because there was some kind of loyal love for women in music.

A second answer to that is that I always felt uncomfortable about there being such a fuss made over women in music. Because there was Josephine Baker and Nina Simone and Joni Mitchell and so many women before us, I felt like people were acting like we invented it suddenly, and we weren't. We still had a lot to prove. It was all of our first records. We were completely wet behind the ears, and it was almost blasphemous to me to be taken so seriously. The real proof is in the pudding of a career. It's how well can you keep writing, how well can you keep creating.

The pop machine exists around that. I've always tried to concentrate on good work, and I think good work is rewarded. So is pop sensation. Pop sensation is very well rewarded--going to the right parties and being followed around by paparazzi, getting in a magazine and helping people sell records--that isn't necessarily about music, but that's OK too. I don't feel like it affects my job, or my living. I've had unbelievable success on every record, and it's been thrilling for me, and my whole goal is just to ride all of it out. I just keep my little blinders on and keep my eyes focused on what I think good writing is and what I think good art is. I hope that, in 40 years, that will pay off.