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Jane Richmond Hyslop (born 15 February 1967), known professionally as Jane Child, is a Canadian singer, songwriter and record-producer. Her single "Don't Wanna Fall in Love" was number two for three consecutive weeks on the Billboard Hot 100 from April 14 to April 28, 1990. She is also known for her unusual fashion style, which included a hairstyle made of spikes and ankle-length braids and a nose chain piercing.
At age 12 she joined the Canadian Opera Company's children's chorus, and soon after studied piano briefly at the Royal Conservatory of Music under Samuel Dolin. At age 15 she dropped out of school despite good grades. While seeking a summer job she saw an ad in a newspaper for a band looking for a keyboardist, which she applied for and joined. It was a touring rock and roll band of Deadheads known as Summerhill that played remote northern Canadian towns, and paid her $25 a week. She played the synthesizer, piano, and organ, and sang in their shows for over 45 weeks in their first year together. She also had various other musical jobs, such as organist at the Anglican church in her neighbourhood and at horse-shows, playing piano for ballet classes and at piano bars, and recording jingles for commercials.
Her debut album, Jane Child, released in 1989, was fully written and produced by Child, who also performed all the vocals and played all the instruments (except for the guitar parts), a rarity for a debut artist signed to a major label. Due to her musical style and her emphasis on control over her music, she was at the time labelled by the press as "the female Prince".
Her single "Don't Wanna Fall in Love", peaked at No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1990. The song was also a big hit on the R&B chart, peaking at No. 6. Her previous single, "Welcome to the Real World", was a modest hit, peaking at No. 49 on the Billboard Hot 100.
In 1993, she released her second album, Here Not There. In the album, she broadened her R&B sound to mix it with traces of rock, grunge, and Eastern music. The album and its singles were commercial failures, and she was dropped from the label and kept a low profile for the rest of the decade, though she recorded a few collaborations with Japanese artists in that country.
In 2001, she re-recorded the song "World Lullabye" from her debut album and sold the single through her website. All proceeds were donated to the Twin Towers Fund.
Her third album, Surge, was released in early 2002 on her own label, Sugarwave.
She recorded a cover of Tina Turner's "We Don't Need Another Hero" for the tribute album, What's Love? A Tribute to Tina Turner, released in 2004.
Child would do her own cataloguing for programming, including the samples and sequences, often for 14 hours at a time. She writes left handed and would sing as she wrote, also coming up with the bass line with her left hand. In studio some of the gear she used included Fairlight, Sequential Circuits Prophet-5 and T-8, LinnDrum, E-mu SP12, Synclavier, Roland MSQ-700 and the Roland SBX-80. For tours her gear included a Minimoog, a Solina (ARP String Ensemble), a Mini-Korg, a Hammond B3 with a Leslie 145, and a Yamaha CP-70 electric grand.
In 1990, she purchased the 1917 Los Angeles house of Vidah Bickford, a locally based guitarist and mandolinist. She enjoys collecting Citroens and antiques.
| Songwriter of the Year | ||||
| Producer of the Year | ||||
| "Don't Wanna Fall in Love" | Dance Recording of the Year | |||
| 1989 | Jane Child | Warner Records | 49 | 40 |
| 1993 | Here Not There | — | — | |
| 2002 | Surge | Sugarwave | — | — |
| "—" denotes releases that did not chart. | ||||
| + !Year !Title !Label | ||
| 2002 | Surge Remixed | Sugarwave |
| + ! scope="col" rowspan="2" | Year ! scope="col" rowspan="2" | Title ! scope="col" rowspan="2" | Album ! scope="col" rowspan="2" | Label ! scope="col" colspan="6" | Peak chart positions | ||||
| 1989 | "Welcome to the Real World" | Jane Child | Warner Records | 59 | 49 | ― | ― | ― | ― |
| 1990 | "Don't Wanna Fall in Love" | 4 | 2 | 11 | 6 | 22 | 97 | ||
| 1992 | "Mona Lisa Smiles" | Here Not There | ― | ― | ― | ― | ― | ― | |
| 1993 | "Here Not There" | ― | ― | ― | ― | ― | ― | ||
| "Do Whatcha Do" | ― | ― | ― | ― | ― | ― | |||
| "Perfect Love" | ― | ― | ― | ― | ― | ― | |||
| 1994 | "All I Do" | 80 | ― | 25 | ― | ― | ― | ||
| 2001 | "World Lullabye 2001" | Sugarwave | ― | ― | ― | ― | ― | ― | |
| "Almost Beautiful" | Surge | ― | ― | ― | ― | ― | ― | ||
| 2002 | "Nice Day" | ― | ― | ― | ― | ― | ― | ||
| "—" denotes releases that did not chart or were not released in that territory. | |||||||||
| + !Year !Title !Label | ||
| 1998 | "Maybe Tomorrow" (Tomohiko Nishimura feat. Jane Child) | Fun House |
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