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Harry Styles aside, the solo careers of former members of televised singing competition groups seldom grip the audience's attention. These efforts typically adhere to certain rules – either an attempt at a more edgy urban music style, complete with at least a track including a guest appearance by an American rapper, or a move into mature mainstream-approved polished adult contemporary – and they usually amount to a dimly remembered placeholder, the sight and sound of someone gamely killing time before the inevitable band comeback concerts.

A Unique Journey

It’s a state of affairs that renders the unconventional route currently taken by former Little Mix member Jade Thirlwall surprisingly refreshing. She’s certainly not above engaging in the typical activities that former talent show band members are known for undertaking, including loudly underlining that she’s no longer subject the press-managed restrictions of the factory-produced music business – based on the audience this evening, the top-selling product on the merchandise stall is a handheld cooling device displaying the phrase “TINA SAYS YOU’RE A CUNT”, a lyric from the track Gossip, her collaboration with electronic pair the group Confidence Man – but nevertheless, the songs she has chosen to create is pop of a noticeably more intriguing stripe than usual.

An Impressive First Single

She opened her solo account with the previous year's excellent her debut single Angel Of My Dreams, a deeply odd, jolting and fragmented melange of grand emotional pop songs, loud electronic instruments and audio excerpts from the classic track Puppet On A String by Sandie Shaw.

During the performance on her first solo tour demonstrates, not every song on her debut album That’s Showbiz, Baby! is quite as interesting as that: the track Before You Break My Heart is insanely catchy, but it's equally typical dancefloor-oriented pop, driven by precisely the Supremes sample its title suggests; things are padded out with a cover of Madonna’s Frozen that transforms into a medley of 90s dance hits, from the track Pacific State by 808 State to Set You Free by N-Trance.

More Intriguing Material

However, there exists additional where Angel Of My Dreams came from. Headache melds an Abba-esque chorus with verses that present a nearly discordant style of rhythmic music or are surrounded with cavernous echo. She dedicates the track Unconditional to her mum: it has a fabulous melody, eighties-style electronic percussion, and powerful guitar riffs combined with clanging industrial drums. IT Girl surprisingly resurrects the musical aesthetic of 2000s electronic punk movement, or rather the exciting variation of millennium-era popular music that was strongly inspired by electroclash, while Natural at Disaster starts out like a keyboard-led emotional song before unexpectedly swerving into a dark computerized noise.

A Charming Performer

The artist on stage is a hugely appealing, cheerily unvarnished figure: she is, she states at a certain moment, “shaking like a shitting dog”; giving a shoutout to her queer audience members, who are present in large numbers, she proposes showing appreciation by including a branded jockstrap to the merchandise booth.

Future Possibilities

It may well end the way such individual artistic pursuits end – the enmity towards ex-group member her previous colleague Jesy Nelson expressed in the song Natural at Disaster resolved, a media announcement to declare that Little Mix are reunited – but the reality that every attendee seem to be word-perfect as they join in vocally to a record that was released just a month ago causes one to ponder. And even if it does, the final performance of Angel Of My Dreams emphasizes that Jade's individual musical path is unlikely to recede into the realms of the dimly remembered placeholder.

• Jade performs at the O2 Victoria Warehouse in Manchester this evening and is traveling across the United Kingdom through October 23rd.