Born into a musical family, Janet was raised on music from an early age.
Her father was a professional trombonist who, at a very young age, started playing with the Big Band greats like The Dorsey Brothers, Count Basie, and Benny Goodman, just to name a few.
Her mother graduated from Yale School of Music, was gigging at Jazz clubs, and met Janet's father through musician friends.
Janet wrote her first song at age 10. She then played keys in her first band, a southern rock group, at age 12. They played all ages shows in the area. At age 14, again s, she joined a YES tribute band and played schools and parties with them. At 16, now bult up her synthesizer collection and played ina LED ZEPPLIN cover band. This was her intoduction to the club circuit.
Since Janet was doing this while still in high school, her mother, very supportive of her career, would do her homework for her while Janet's brother would drive her to shows.
While cruising in a car one night, singing Heart tunes with a friend in the backseat, Janet got one of her first words of encouragement about her singing from friend Ray Gillen (Badlands vocalist), who was in the front seat. Janet was singing with her eyes closed and having a great time. Upon opening her eyes, she saw Ray with a huge smile watching her and he said, "You've got a really great voice. Seriously. You really do." That meant alot coming from such an amazing talent as he.
A short time later, a drummer friend had asked Janet to front a band. Janet never considered herself a lead singer before but felt right at home. With this band, she performed the big rock clubs around Northern Jersey and quickly gained a recognition for her vocal abililty.
Ms. Rains then branched off and formed her own band, Little Sister. Since she already was well known in the area, Little Sister quickly rose to popularity and gigged in all the major venues in NJ and started playing the cool rock clubs in NYC. They opened for many National Acts, creating a nice buzz that would attract the area's elite rock stars including members of Anthrax. There were record company interests but no bites. A female fronted hard rock band was risky at this time.
Janet's father passed away in Las Vegas. Janet and her brother flew there to take care of things and Janet ended up staying for a few months. Crossing paths with Joe Lynn Turner, a friend from Jersey who was fronting DEEP PURPLE at the time, Joe suggested she co-write with a guitarist in LA who had backing. Off to LA she went. She stayed in LA for a year and a half, writing music, making friends and reflecting.
Although she still considers LA like a second home, Janet returned to the NYC area and started performing under her own name and doing Jingle work. JOE LYNN TURNER had asked Janet to sing backup on his record, "Undercover" which was her first International album debut. All of this was nicely interrupted by a year long tour as LIZ PHAIR'S sole backing singer.
With Liz, Janet toured across America, toured with Alanis Morissette, and LILITH FAIR in which she shared the stage with Sheryl Crow, Dixie Chicks and Sarah McLachlan. She even appeared on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno, Rosie O'Donnell, and Sessions@West54th.
After the tour, Janet got back to playing in the NYC area and did some collaborations with Ty Tabor of King's X, Christian Nesmith (son of Mike Nesmith of The Monkees) and others. She was active in studio work and spent alot of time on the road with King's X.
Since she earned her Screen Actors Guild card by doing Jingle work, Janet decided to use this advantage to get Union work as a background actor in Major Film & TV. She has been on Sex & The City, Law & Order, Ugly Betty, 30 Rock, Six Degrees, Hitch (Will Smith), The Devil Wears Prada, School for Scoundrels (Billy Bob Thornton), Reign Over Me (Adam Sandler), Sex & The City Movie, & Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2, as well as work in a music video by the band, Jzabehl. You can view the video for "It's All About Me" on YouTube.com.
Currently Janet co-fronts New Wave Band M80 (www.myspace.com/m80band) and plays around the Northern East Coast. She has a few projects in the works, so stay tuned!
Myspace Layouts
Myspace Codes
Myspace Generators
Myspace Backgrounds
Myspace Generators
