The seven biggest revelations from

From McDonald’s jingles to musical cop shows and touring with Michael Jackson, the singer-songwriter opens up about her life and career.

Amulti-Grammy-winning artist who has sold more than 50 million albums worldwide, Sheryl Crow has been described as the voice of a generation. Now, she is front and centre in new documentary Sheryl, which sees the All I Wanna Do and Everyday Is a Winding Road singersongwriter open up about her sometimes tumultuous career and private life.

Director Amy Scott was behind 2018’s similarly entertaining and enlightening Hal, which focused on the eclectic Hollywood director Hal Ashby, and this ‘‘confessional’’ is just as absorbing and sometimes shocking. Here are our favourite revelations.

McDonald’s gave Crow her first big break

Struggling to make ends meet as a school music teacher in Kennett, Missouri, in the late 1980s, Crow says her first brush with fame was when she was tapped to sing a jingle (essentially Old MacDonald Had a Farm in a variety of voices) for a certain fast-food restaurant empire.

‘‘I made more in 45 minutes of work for McDonald’s [US$42,000] than I did in two years of teaching,’’ she laments. It led to more commercials – and eventually her decision to try her luck in Los Angeles.

She starred on an episode of Cop Rock

Many would remember Steven Bochco’s policeprocedurals like Hill Street Blues and NYPD Blue, but who can recall his short-lived 1990 crimesolving musical series Cop Rock? Crow does, because she starred as an undercover policewoman in the 11th and last episode ever made of the critical and commercial disaster.

‘‘I did a dance routine and a song – I think it might have already been cancelled,’’ she said of the story which involved an investigation into multiple reports of college students being sexually assaulted and raped by an unknown assailant (which inspires the unfortunately titled Crow-sung number I Got Something For You).

Singing on Michael Jackson’s Bad Tour was a strange experience

After a successful audition, Crow says she was given ‘‘a look’’ and fitted for costumes. She remembers being invited to watch 1953 western Shane and episodes of 1950s sitcom Amos ‘n’ Andy with Jackson and Bubbles the Chimp. ‘‘He used a ballpoint pen in the chest to control Bubbles whenever he got out of hand,’’ Crow remembers. ‘‘Even when I’m telling it, I think ‘this is like the weirdest thing ever’. I didn’t really get to know him. And I didn’t think anything of him having a couple of little boys on the road with him at different times. I was naive. Now it makes me sad for the life he had... and for the children. It’s just