SPIN
June 1997
by Suzan Colon
"The people who come backstage at our shows are the ones who are excited about this kind of mix of electronic music and guitar," says singer/electro-vixen Jane Jensen. "But we also get a lot of little girls who have crushes on their friends and want advice."
It's a good example of Jensen's own dual persona. On one hand, her debut album, Comic Book Whore, is a sort of missing link to future sounds, deep with drum machines, fuzzy guitars, and altered-state vocals. On the other, Jane's malevolent-little-girl-lost singing style and occasional lapses into pop cuteness present her as a high-school cheerleader gone industrial. "Luv Song," for instance, is joyously disjointed, a combination of a drum loop rhumba and girlish howls, while the infectious chorus of "King" is so sweet it can't be sung by any man who values his testosterone. "If I had a motto, it would be 'all for immaturity,' " Jensen asserts.
A native of Indianapolis, Jensen moved to Chicago around college time because she heard the music scene was good; she went to school by day and studied with disco industrial heads by night. "Our band, Oxygiene 23, was based on mythological themes and sounded very melancholy," she recalls. "I wanted to get away from that and write songs that were more groove- and humor-oriented." She got away from it quite literally when she moved to New York, where she investigated a different road to rhythm by joining an Isadora Duncan dance group. There, she wrote most of the songs that would end up on Comic Book. "The neighborhood I lived in had great Indian food, but not a lot else," she says. "So I got a lot done."
While it would seem that Jensen's brand of groove theory could make her a pinup for the next sound wave, Jensen can't see it happening. "Aww, they've been saying that the electronic thing will be big for ten years now, and it never happens," Jensen demurs. "It means more when people just shout ~'You rock~!' and leave it at that."
