🔗 Share this article Jade Thirlwall Review: The Music World's Quirkiest Artist Rises Above Manufactured Past With the exception of Harry Styles, individual artistic journeys of ex-participants of TV talent show-manufactured bands rarely capture the public imagination. They usually follow certain rules – either an attempt at a more edgy urban music style, complete with at least one single including a guest appearance by an US hip-hop artist, or a move into mature mainstream-approved smooth pop-rock territory – and they usually amount to a dimly remembered placeholder, the visual and auditory experience of someone gamely killing time before the inevitable band comeback concerts. A Unique Journey It’s a state of affairs that makes the idiosyncratic path currently taken by former Little Mix member Jade Thirlwall oddly invigorating. She’s certainly not above engaging in the typical activities that former talent show band members are known for undertaking, including emphatically stating that she’s no longer subject the media-trained constraints of the factory-produced music business – judging by the audience this evening, the most popular item 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 dance duo Confidence Man – but regardless, the songs she has chosen to create is pop of a noticeably more intriguing stripe than usual. A Superb Debut She launched her individual career with the previous year's excellent her debut single Angel Of My Dreams, a highly unusual, jarring and disjointed melange of grand emotional pop songs, 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 demonstrates, not everything on her first full-length release her album That’s Showbiz, Baby! is equally fascinating as that: Before You Break My Heart is insanely catchy, but it's equally standard-issue disco pop, powered by precisely the Supremes sample its title suggests; the show is extended with a interpretation of Madonna’s Frozen that devolves into a medley of 90s dance hits, from 808’s Pacific State to N-Trance’s Set You Free. More Intriguing Material However, there exists additional where Angel Of My Dreams came from. The song Headache melds an catchy refrain reminiscent of Abba with song sections that offer a nearly discordant brand of funk or are enfolded by deep reverberation. She offers the track Unconditional to her mum: it has a wonderful tune, early 80s syndrums, and crashing rock guitar combined with metallic pounding beats. IT Girl surprisingly resurrects the musical aesthetic of early 00s electroclash, or more accurately the exciting variation of early 00s pop that was strongly inspired by electroclash, while Natural at Disaster starts out like a piano ballad before suddenly shifting into a dark computerized noise. An Appealing Presence The woman at its centre is a hugely appealing, cheerily unvarnished presence: she declares, she states at a certain moment, “shaking like a shitting dog”; giving a shoutout to her LGBTQ+ fanbase, who are here in force, she proposes thanking them by adding a official undergarment to the merchandise booth. Future Possibilities It could conclude the manner such individual artistic pursuits typically finish – the enmity towards former bandmate her previous colleague Jesy Nelson voiced within the song Natural at Disaster patched up, a media announcement to declare that Little Mix are reunited – but the fact that every attendee seem to be knowing every lyric as they join in vocally to an album that only came out a month ago makes you wonder. And should it occur, the final Angel Of My Dreams emphasizes that Thirlwall’s solo career is not destined to fade into the domain of the barely recalled interim project. Jade plays the Manchester venue O2 Victoria Warehouse in Manchester this evening and is touring the UK through October 23rd.