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With the exception of Harry Styles, individual artistic journeys of ex-participants of TV talent show-manufactured bands seldom grip the public imagination. These efforts typically adhere to certain rules – often a pursuit at a toughened-up R&B sound, replete with at least a track including a cameo by an US hip-hop artist, or a lunge towards mature Radio 2-friendly polished adult contemporary – and they usually amount to a barely recalled interim project, the sight and sound of someone gamely killing time before the inevitable reunion tour.

A Unique Journey

This common scenario that makes the idiosyncratic path currently taken by former Little Mix member Jade Thirlwall surprisingly refreshing. She definitely participates in doing the kind of things that former talent show band members are wont to do, including loudly underlining that she’s no longer subject 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 fan emblazoned with the phrase “TINA SAYS YOU’RE A CUNT”, a lyric from Gossip, her collaboration with dance duo the group Confidence Man – but nevertheless, the music she’s opted to make is pop of a noticeably more intriguing stripe than usual.

A Superb Debut

She opened her solo account with last year’s superb Angel Of My Dreams, a deeply odd, jolting and disjointed mixture of big pop balladry, noisy synthesisers and audio excerpts from the classic track Puppet On A String by Sandie Shaw.

As the set on her first solo tour demonstrates, not every song on her debut album That’s Showbiz, Baby! is equally fascinating as her debut single: the track Before You Break My Heart is extremely memorable, but it’s also standard-issue disco pop, powered by precisely the Supremes sample its title suggests; things are padded out with a cover of the Madonna classic Frozen that devolves into a medley of nineties club anthems, from 808’s Pacific State to Set You Free by N-Trance.

More Intriguing Material

But there’s also more where Angel Of My Dreams came from. The song Headache melds an Abba-esque chorus with song sections that offer a nearly discordant style of rhythmic music or are enfolded by deep reverberation. She dedicates Unconditional to her mum: it has a fabulous melody, early 80s syndrums, and crashing rock guitar allied to clanging industrial drums. The song IT Girl unexpectedly reanimates the sound of early 00s electroclash, or rather the thrilling strain of millennium-era popular music that was strongly inspired by the electroclash genre, while the track Natural at Disaster starts out like a keyboard-led emotional song before unexpectedly swerving into a malevolent electronic grind.

A Charming Performer

The artist on stage is a immensely likable, delightfully authentic presence: she declares, 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 suggests thanking them by adding a official undergarment to the merchandise booth.

Future Possibilities

It may well end the manner such individual artistic pursuits typically finish – the hostility towards ex-group member Jesy Nelson voiced within the song Natural at Disaster resolved, a media announcement to declare that Little Mix are reunited – but the reality that every attendee appear knowing every lyric as they join in vocally to a record that was released just a month ago makes you wonder. And even if it does, the closing Angel Of My Dreams emphasizes that Thirlwall’s solo career is not destined to fade into the realms of the dimly remembered placeholder.

• Jade plays the Manchester venue O2 Victoria Warehouse in the city of Manchester this evening and is traveling across the United Kingdom until 23 October.