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Harry Styles aside, the solo careers of ex-participants of televised singing competition groups seldom grip the public imagination. These efforts typically adhere to predictable patterns – either an attempt at a toughened-up R&B sound, replete with at least one single including a cameo by an US hip-hop artist, or a move into mature Radio 2-friendly smooth pop-rock territory – and they typically become a barely recalled interim project, the sight and sound of someone enthusiastically passing the years 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’s certainly not above engaging in the typical activities that former talent show band members are wont to do, including loudly underlining that she's free from the media-trained constraints 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 legend “TINA SAYS YOU’RE A CUNT”, a song line from Gossip, her musical partnership with electronic pair the group Confidence Man – but regardless, the music she’s opted to make is pop of a noticeably more intriguing stripe than the norm.

A Superb Debut

She launched her individual career with last year’s superb her debut single Angel Of My Dreams, a deeply odd, jolting and disjointed melange of big pop balladry, 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 everything on her debut album her album That’s Showbiz, Baby! is quite as interesting as her debut single: the track Before You Break My Heart is insanely catchy, but it's equally typical dancefloor-oriented pop, powered 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 nineties club anthems, from the track Pacific State by 808 State to N-Trance’s Set You Free.

More Intriguing Material

But there’s also more where Angel Of My Dreams came from. 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 offers Unconditional to her mum: it has a fabulous melody, eighties-style electronic percussion, and crashing rock guitar allied to metallic pounding beats. IT Girl surprisingly resurrects the sound of early 00s electroclash, or more accurately the thrilling strain of early 00s pop that was strongly inspired by the electroclash genre, while the track Natural at Disaster begins like a piano ballad before unexpectedly swerving into a malevolent electronic grind.

An Appealing Presence

The woman at its centre is a hugely appealing, cheerily unvarnished figure: she is, she announces at one point, “shaking like a shitting dog”; giving a shoutout to her queer audience members, who are here in force, she suggests showing appreciation by adding a official undergarment to the merch stand.

Future Possibilities

It could conclude the way such individual artistic pursuits end – the hostility towards ex-group member her previous colleague Jesy Nelson expressed in the song Natural at Disaster patched up, a media announcement to announce that the original group are reunited – but the fact that the entire audience seem to be word-perfect as they join in vocally to a record that was released just a few weeks prior makes you wonder. And should it occur, the final Angel Of My Dreams emphasizes that Jade's individual musical path is unlikely to recede into the domain of the barely recalled interim project.

• Jade performs at the Manchester venue O2 Victoria Warehouse in Manchester tonight and is touring the UK through October 23rd.