Jane Inc. began as both a product of lockdowns and a statement of liberation. The pandemic-spawned project has allowed its CEO —Toronto-based artist Carlyn Bezic—to present a more stylistically promiscuous, lyrically provocative identity separate from her collaborative pursuits in the U.S. Girls universe, reinventing this seasoned indie axe-slinger as an all-seeing art-pop auteur equally enamored with electro-disco and bossa nova, like a DIY Madonna who never left the Danceteria. But the euphoric feeling of self-discovery captured on Jane Inc.’s first two albums— 2021’s Number One and 2022’s Faster Than I Can Take—was offset by anxieties over the horrors outside her window and life in their aftermath. “I can’t square the calm/And the eerie feeling of a world on pause,” Bezic sang on the latter album’s title track, “With my heart sprinting in my chest/ Trying to guess what’s next.”
Jane Inc.’s third album, A RUPTURE A CANYON A BIRTH, begins in a similar state: “My heart’s beating out of my chest,” she repeats on the opening track, though in this case, the death she’s contemplating is her own. In April 2023, Bezic was on tour with U.S. Girls when her band’s van broke down on a Massachusetts freeway. While they were waiting on the side of the road for a tow truck, a semi crashed into their vehicle. Fortunately, everyone walked away from the accident, but it proved to be the opening chapter to a tumultuous year for Belzic that saw the end of a decade-long relationship and a surgical procedure to remove a cancerous growth from her vocal cord.
It was one of those periods when all the usual fortune-cookie cliches start to feel like holy scripture, and A RUPTURE A CANYON A BIRTH is the resultant gospel according to Bezic. When she says she’s been “reborn on the dancefloor” on the album’s namesake opening track, she’s not just another indie rocker surrendering to the transforming, soul-purifying power of house music; she’s heralding the promotion of Jane Inc. from a fantasy alter-ego to a real-world manifestation, one that’s inspiring her to approach both life and music with the same uninhibited, unfiltered attitude.
