Jewel is used to rocking stadiums but the pop star doesn’t mind letting her hair down with a sneaky undercover karaoke sesh at a dive bar. Funny or Die put the star up to the task of singing her own songs at a local joint while disguised as a mild-mannered businesswoman and seeing if the crowd recognize her.
The team really went all out, kitting out Jewel with a wig, Coke bottle glasses, an enormous prosthetic nose and a “plumpening suit” which gave the singer some serious booty. Jewel was also planted in a group of middle-aged businessmen who set the stage by insisting that their colleague “Karen” come up to sing. The crowd got into it and chanted for “Karen” to come up and strut her stuff onstage and then they got a real big surprise. Check out the video below.
“Karen” initially acted shy but when she started singing and that iconic country pop voice came out on her hit “Who Will Save Your Soul”, the audience lit up, with several standing open mouthed in shock. The crowd then demanded an encore from the star, who while still in disguise, broke into her song “Foolish Games”, which got the whole crowd waving their hands and singing along.
The audience then gave Jewel’s performance a rapturous applause, still thinking she was a regular businesswoman who just happened to have the voice of a star. Jewel then made her exit, took off the disguise then returned to give them a real show, singing “You Were Meant For Me” which got an enthusiastic singalong from the pumped crowd. You can hear Jewel perform the song with her full band in the video below.
Jewel reflected on singing “You Were Meant For Me” at the small venue, commenting “the whole bar was singing along. I wrote that song when I was 18 and here we are years later and the whole bar and karaoke kids are all singing it. Everybody knew all the words – it was really sweet.”
The performance got quite a reaction from the crowd, with one punter commenting “at first when I saw her sitting I thought you know she’s kinda homely looking, but then when she started singing, she was so sexy with how she danced.” The man added that it was the first time any singer got an encore at the bar, referring to “Karen’s” second song. He then admitted that he thought the businesswoman did a better job than Jewel before the producer dropped the bomb on him that they were the same singer, to which the shocked man admitted the whole bit was “genius”.
Fans watching the session online also got a kick out of the video, adding comments such as “Jewel was perfect for this gag. She performed in a LOT of coffeehouses before she made it big, so this probably felt just like home to her,” and “no Auto-Tune, no lip sync… she sounds exactly like she does on her albums. She probably had just as much fun as the crowd did.” If you would like to see more from Jewel, you can subscribe to her YouTube channel. You can also visit her official website for more information.