Jewel is 25 days from the release of her first country album, and she'll stop by to talk about the project tonight with guest host Suzanne Alexander on GAC's "Top 20 Country Countdown."

A number of artists got their starts in pop music, only to find greater success in country, including Conway Twitty and Dan Seals, but the list of people who tried to make the transition and failed is even larger. Jewel, who earned several pop hits during the 1990s, has gotten off to an impressive start with her first country single, "Stronger Woman," which stands at No. 11 on the countdown, and you can bet she'll push hard to succeed in the genre.

"I'm really tenacious," she told the national radio show GAC Nights: Live From Nashville. "I've been down and out a lot. But I've always been a real fighter. I'm a scrapper, sort of. I'm pretty resilient, and I always try to have a good, positive effect on a situation I'm in. I've never believed in being a victim, even when I was homeless. I was homeless for a year, and I always thought it was up to me. The world doesn't owe me; it's up to me to figure out how to make myself happy and get what I need for myself. I think that's probably a good quality."

Jewel takes off this summer on Brad Paisley's tour, kicking off with a June 11 show in Albuquerque, N.M.