[2] Born at the Saint Andre Home in Biddeford, Maine,[3][4] to an unmarried teenage mother, Wasser was placed for adoption at infancy.

[3] At the age of 18, Wasser began her music career during her studies at the College of Fine Arts, Boston University.

[8] Wasser soon grew disillusioned and found that she "didn't want to make classical music my life, the Beethoven symphonies have already been played a million times and I am not going to do it any better".

[5] Instead, she joined a number of local punk bands trying "to bridge the gap between the guitar and the bass and play the violin really loud".

[9] Wasser augmented her role within the band, adding guitar and keyboard parts, singing vocals, as well as co-writing several songs as found on the album Against the Stars.

[13][14] Wasser first began to make a name for herself in the indie rock world during her time in The Dambuilders as she developed her aggressive style of playing, which led to work outside the group.

[5] She continued to play with Those Bastard Souls, a band started in 1995 by a close friend of the couple, Dave Shouse of Grifters.

[7] The end of Black Beetle in June 2002 brought the beginning of Wasser's work as a solo artist and the creation of a new band, Joan as Police Woman.

[21] The group self-released a five-track eponymous EP in 2004,[22] as Wasser had "decided to do it without a record deal because I wanted to make music on my own terms".

[23] In December 2005, Wasser signed a distribution deal with Reveal Records,[24] a British indie label, which subsequently re-released the self-titled debut EP,[5] while adding one track.

[20][25] Joan as Police Woman's full-length debut, Real Life, appeared in the UK on June 12, 2006, and through PIAS in Europe and elsewhere.

[29] The album included three singles, "Christobel",[30] "The Ride",[31] and "Eternal Flame",[32] which was supported by a video directed by Leah Meyerhoff.

[3] With Rainy Orteca departing to pursue her own projects, Wasser and Kindred were joined by Timo Ellis on bass guitar for touring in 2008.

Emily Mackay, writing for The Guardian, describes Wasser's return to her "characteristically languorous, smoky zone".

In 2019 Wasser participated in an Africa Express concert[47] of March 29[48] organized by Damon Albarn, where she met fellow performer Tony Allen.

She provided vocals and plays the violin on the song "Ballad of a Deadman" alongside David Sylvian on Steve Jansen's album Slope which was released in 2007.

Wasser was credited for playing piano, violin, and guitar as well as contributing vocals on Lloyd Cole's 2010 release, Broken Record.

[citation needed] In 2014, she released a track on the Printer Clips album, the side-project of Bell X 1's lead singer Paul Noonan.

[citation needed] Also in 2014, she began to work and perform with Scottish folk outfit Lau, producing their album The Bell That Never Rang, released in May 2015.