BORN: May 16, 1966, Gary, IN

Janet Jackson is the ninth and last child in the musically talented Jackson family that includes the Jackson 5, Michael Jackson, and Jermaine Jackson. Janet Jackson performed on stage with her brothers at the age of seven. At ten, she acted in the TV series Good Times and was later seen in Diff'rent Strokes and Fame. She released her first album, Janet Jackson, in 1982 and her second, Dream Street, in 1984, but neither of these records was notably successful. Then, in 1985, Jackson turned to the production team of Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis (formerly of the Time) for the album Control, which, ironically, emphasized the artist's new maturity and independence, even though most of the songs were co-compositions of the three. Control was a massive hit: it topped the charts, selling more than four million copies, and spawned five Top Ten hits, including the #1 "When I Think of You."

The follow-up, Rhythm Nation 1814, did even better, spawning seven Top Ten hits, among them the #1s "Miss You Much," "Escapade," and "Black Cat." In 1991, Jackson signed a new recording contract with Virgin Records for a reported $32

Review
Janet Jackson talks too much. Seven of the 22 tracks on "The Velvet Rope" are so-called interludes -- spoken-word pieces meant to lend extra dramatic gravity to a record already heavy with moral instruction. It's as if Jackson doesn't trust the thrust of her music -- the Prince-style electrogallop of "Free Xone," the drum-and-bass crackle of "Empty" -- or the stout heart in her buttery singing to carry the load. And the message itself is confusing: a lecture in tolerance and tearing down walls by a woman who routinely positions herself on record, in public, as an object of worship. Except for those rare, explosive episodes when Jackson truly loses herself in the locomotion -- the happy house beats of "Together Again," the hopping-mad cadence of "What About" -- "The Velvet Rope" feels like a grand exercise in contrived honesty.

Jackson wants you to believe she's a woman in charge. Ani DiFranco doesn't care what you think; she's been running her own show from the ground up for years. "Living in Clip" is a career-defining package, an indie-rebel-folk "Frampton Comes Alive" that celebrates DiFranco's entrepreneurial savvy, the iconoclastic vigor of her songwriting and her prowess as a performer. In agenda and mood, she evokes improbable but wholly believable flashes of Pete Seeger, Chrissie Hynde, "Blood on the Tracks"-era Bob Dylan and -- come on, go with this -- an acoustic, well-tempered Hole. But if there is plenty of punk here, it's punk as autonomous action and dedicated purpose -- a work ethic of the heart: "I just write about what I should have done/I sing what I wish I could say/And I hope somewhere, some woman hears my music/And it helps her through her day" ("I'm No Heroine"). That goes for guys as well.