Jade Review: The Music World's Quirkiest Artist Transcends Manufactured Origins
Harry Styles aside, the solo careers of former members of televised singing competition groups rarely capture the public imagination. They usually follow predictable patterns – often a pursuit at a more edgy urban music style, replete with at least one single including a cameo by an American rapper, or a lunge towards mature mainstream-approved polished adult contemporary – and they typically become a dimly remembered placeholder, the sight and sound of someone gamely killing time prior to the unavoidable band comeback concerts.
An Idiosyncratic Path
It’s a state of affairs that renders the unconventional route currently taken by former Little Mix member Jade Thirlwall oddly invigorating. She definitely participates in engaging in the typical activities that ex-reality TV group artists are known for undertaking, among them emphatically stating that she’s no longer subject the media-trained constraints of the manufactured pop industry – based on tonight’s crowd, the top-selling product on the merchandise stall is a fan displaying the phrase “TINA SAYS YOU’RE A CUNT”, a song line from the track Gossip, her collaboration with electronic pair the group Confidence Man – but regardless, the songs she has chosen to create is pop music with a far more fascinating style than usual.
An Impressive First Single
She opened her solo account with the previous year's excellent Angel Of My Dreams, a highly unusual, jarring and fragmented mixture of big pop balladry, loud electronic instruments and audio excerpts from the classic track Puppet On A String by Sandie Shaw.
As the set on her initial individual concert series proves, not every song on her first full-length release That’s Showbiz, Baby! is quite as interesting as that: Before You Break My Heart is extremely memorable, but it's equally standard-issue disco pop, driven by exactly the Motown musical snippet its title suggests; things are padded out with a interpretation of Madonna’s Frozen that devolves into a medley of 90s dance hits, from the track Pacific State by 808 State to Set You Free by N-Trance.
Additional Fascinating Content
However, there exists additional material in the vein of Angel Of My Dreams. The song Headache combines an catchy refrain reminiscent of Abba with song sections that offer a nearly discordant style of rhythmic music or are enfolded by cavernous echo. She dedicates Unconditional to her mum: it has a fabulous melody, early 80s syndrums, and crashing rock guitar allied to metallic pounding beats. IT Girl unexpectedly reanimates the sound of early 00s electroclash, or rather the exciting variation of early 00s pop that was heavily influenced by the electroclash genre, while the track 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 hugely appealing, cheerily unvarnished presence: she is, 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 adding a official undergarment to the merchandise booth.
Future Possibilities
It may well end the way these kind of solo careers end – the hostility towards ex-group member her previous colleague Jesy Nelson voiced within Natural at Disaster patched up, a press conference to declare that the original group are back – but the reality that every attendee appear word-perfect as they sing along to a record that was released just a few weeks prior causes one to ponder. And even if it does, the closing Angel Of My Dreams emphasizes that Thirlwall’s solo career is unlikely to recede into the domain of the barely recalled interim project.
Jade performs at the Manchester venue O2 Victoria Warehouse in the city of Manchester tonight and is touring the UK through October 23rd.
