Jade Review: Pop's Quirkiest Artist Rises Above Manufactured Past

Harry Styles aside, the solo careers of former members of televised singing competition groups rarely capture the audience's attention. They usually follow predictable patterns – often a pursuit at a more edgy urban music style, complete with at least one single featuring a guest appearance by an US hip-hop artist, or a move into mature mainstream-approved smooth pop-rock territory – and they typically become a barely recalled interim project, the visual and auditory experience of someone enthusiastically passing the years prior to the unavoidable band comeback concerts.

A Unique Journey

It’s a state of affairs that renders the unconventional route thus far followed by Little Mix’s Jade Thirlwall oddly invigorating. She’s certainly not above doing the kind of things that former talent show band members are wont to do, among them emphatically stating that she’s no longer subject the press-managed restrictions of the manufactured pop industry – judging by the audience this evening, the most popular item on the official goods stand is a handheld cooling device displaying the phrase “TINA SAYS YOU’RE A CUNT”, a lyric from the track Gossip, her musical partnership with electronic pair the group Confidence Man – but nevertheless, the songs she has chosen to create is pop music with a far more fascinating style than usual.

A Superb Debut

She launched her individual career with the previous year's excellent Angel Of My Dreams, a highly unusual, jolting and disjointed mixture of grand emotional pop songs, noisy synthesisers and samples from the classic track Puppet On A String by Sandie Shaw.

As the set on her first solo tour proves, not every song on her first full-length release That’s Showbiz, Baby! is quite as interesting as that: the track Before You Break My Heart is extremely memorable, but it's equally standard-issue disco pop, driven by precisely the Supremes sample the name implies; the show is extended with a interpretation of the Madonna classic Frozen that transforms into a musical compilation of 90s dance hits, from 808’s Pacific State to Set You Free by N-Trance.

Additional Fascinating Content

However, there exists additional where Angel Of My Dreams came from. Headache melds an Abba-esque chorus with song sections that present a nearly discordant brand of funk or are surrounded with cavernous echo. She offers Unconditional to her mother: it features a fabulous melody, eighties-style electronic percussion, and powerful guitar riffs allied to clanging industrial drums. The song IT Girl unexpectedly reanimates the musical aesthetic of 2000s electronic punk movement, or more accurately the exciting variation of early 00s pop that was strongly inspired by the electroclash genre, while Natural at Disaster starts out like a keyboard-led emotional song before suddenly shifting into a malevolent electronic grind.

An Appealing Presence

The artist on stage is a immensely likable, delightfully authentic presence: she declares, she states at a certain moment, “shaking like a shitting dog”; shouting out her LGBTQ+ fanbase, who are present in large numbers, she suggests thanking them by including a branded jockstrap to the merchandise booth.

Future Possibilities

It could conclude the way these kind of solo careers end – the enmity towards ex-group member her previous colleague Jesy Nelson voiced within Natural at Disaster patched up, a press conference to announce that the original group are reunited – but the reality that every attendee seem to be word-perfect as they sing along to a record that only came out a few weeks prior causes one to ponder. And even if it does, the closing performance of Angel Of My Dreams emphasizes that Jade's individual musical path is unlikely to recede into the domain of the dimly remembered placeholder.

• Jade performs at the O2 Victoria Warehouse in the city of Manchester tonight and is touring the UK until 23 October.