Female Songwriters of the 1990s Quiz

Answer: Jewel

Jewel Kilcher, who released albums under the mononym Jewel, ended up becoming a major solo singer-songwriter with the release of "Pieces of You", but not for a couple of years when she became an opening act for Bob Dylan. "Pieces of You" (also featuring the song "You Were Meant For Me") ultimately ended up peaking at number four on the Billboard 200. Jewel would find further success in her genre with her follow-up album, "Spirit", before taking a turn into the pop-dance scene in the 2000s and onto the country music stage soon after that. Nonetheless, the majority of her music through these albums was written by her.

Answer: Sarah McLachlan

After three modestly successful albums, Canadian songwriter Sarah McLachlan released "Surfacing", arguably her most popular album, in 1997. The release was major for the artist, launching singles like "Building a Mystery", "Sweet Surrender", "Angel", and "Adia", all of which would become setlist standards for her in future shows (and her "Mirrorball" live album). "Surfacing" would win four Grammy Awards including Album of the Year and another four Juno Awards in Canada, reaching number two on the Billboard 200. "Adia" charted the highest of her "Surfacing" singles in the U.S., topping off at number three on the Hot 100.

Her subsequent albums would continue to top the charts in Canada for at least two decades after.

Answer: Amanda Marshall

While Amanda Marshall's main audience stayed within Canada, her single "Birmingham" was her most popular in the U.S. and her album sold quite well throughout North America. Ultimately, it went Diamond in Canada, spawning seven singles from the debut alone; she would go on to have a dozen singles in the top twenty on the Canadian charts in the 1990s and early 2000s before dropping off the music scene with her third release-- "Everybody's Got a Story".

Many attributed her disappearance to legal battles with Sony Music Canada, much of which would go unresolved for the greater part of a decade.

Answer: Shawn Colvin

Shawn Colvin's fourth album, "A Few Small Repairs", was probably her biggest breakthrough in the 1990s. Released in 1996, the album's major single, "Sonny Came Home", was a hugely popular radio release which caught the attention of Grammy voters who, in 1998, awarded her both Song of the Year and Record of the Year for the track. During her acceptance speech for the former award, rapper Ol' Dirty Bastard ended up interrupting the proceedings.

Her subsequent albums edged more into the folk genre more than anything else and she did not have another Billboard number one after "Sonny Came Home".

Answer: Sheryl Crow

"Tuesday Night Music Club" was, of course, the album from which "All I Wanna Do" was released, and in 1994 it ended up topping the Billboard Adult Contemporary chart for nearly two months, becoming her biggest hit. The album went seven times platinum in the U.S. alone and drove sales home for her sophomore release, her eponymous album, which brought singles like "If It Makes You Happy", "Everyday Is a Winding Road", and "A Change Would Do You Good" from 1996 to 1997. That album would be her most celebrated critically, resulting in two Grammy Awards.

She would go on to be one of the top female rock musicians of the decade.

Answer: Chantal Kreviazuk

While "Armageddon: The Album" ended up becoming a major hit (bolstered by this song and Aerosmith's "I Don't Want to Miss a Thing") in 1998, Canadian artist Chantal Kreviazuk added it as a bonus track on her second album, "Colour Moving and Still", in 1999.

Much of the album was written by her (and she continued to find success in the 2000s with the release of "What If It All Means Something"), but her breakout hits were the one cover and another that was used on "Dawson's Creek"-- "Feels Like Home".

Her third album was the only one to chart in the U.S.; she continued her popularity streak on Canadian contemporary radio stations.

Answer: Natalie Imbruglia

While Natalie Imbruglia covered "Torn" a couple years after lesser-known band Ednaswap released it in 1995, it didn't matter; her version made her one of the biggest Australian female singers of the decade. Her "Left of the Middle" album (her first) went multiplatinum (in the U.S., UK, Canada, and native Australia to name a few countries) and the song "Torn" became the top played song in America in 1998 (getting her a Grammy nod).

She would become a judge on "The X Factor Australia" in 2010, only staying for the one season.

Answer: Paula Cole

Winner of the Grammy for Best New Artist, Paula Cole found her greatest success in the mid-1990s (though she would continue making music well into the next couple of decades) with songs like the "Dawson's Creek" theme "I Don't Want to Wait" and the adult contemporary track Where "Have All the Cowboys Gone?" She only won the one Grammy despite being nominated for seven in the same year, most of which was for the latter hit and her sophomore album, "This Fire", which went two times platinum in the U.S.

Answer: Alanis Morissette

Then the youngest winner of the Grammy for Album of the Year, Alanis Morissette had two earlier releases that never made a splash, but "Jagged Little Pill" seemed to have a hit at every turn. Songs like "Ironic", "You Learn", "You Oughta Know", "Hand in My Pocket", "All I Really Want", and "Head Over Feet" were on international radios all the time in the mid-1990s and drove further success for Morissette in her follow-up album, "Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie", and in film.

She appeared in Kevin Smith's "Dogma" as God in 1999.

Answer: Fiona Apple

Apple's earlier days found a great amount of success with a contemporary crowd, and her follow-up, "When the Pawn...", did more of the same. The 2000s, however, hit a bit of a snag when Apple's anxiety and compulsive disorder forced her to take lengthy and recurring breaks from music altogether.

She would release albums in 2005 and 2012, both of which would receive immense critical acclaim despite being much more experimental in nature. She's been nominated repeatedly for Grammy Awards, winning one for "Criminal" in 1998.