Jade Thirlwall wrote her “best music” when she stopped worrying about trying to craft a viral hit.
The Little Mix star recently released her debut solo single, ‘Angel Of My Dreams’ – which features a sample of Sandie Shaw’s Eurovision-winning tune ‘Puppet On A String’ – and she’s admitted working on her tracks became much easier when she gave up trying to put together the perfect song for the radio or make a track that would work on TikTok.
During an interview with Rebecca Judd on Apple Music 1, Jade explained: “I think I’ve actually surprised myself creatively. I think the minute I stopped caring as much about like, ‘Oh gosh, what’s going to work on radio, what’s a TikTok hit and all this stuff’, I started writing my best music.
“So I think I needed this time to evolve and know who I am as my own artist.”
Jade insisted she’s embraced an “experimental vibe” for her debut solo album because there is now a lot more “creative freedom” for female artists.
She went on: “There’s a lot of songs on the record that have that same experimental vibe. I’d say the record as a whole, to be honest, I definitely have a few of the kind of, I guess more straight down the line poppy songs on there, but peppered in with the chaos, that is my brain …
“I think there’s a really exciting time in music now where it’s evolved to a point where, especially for women in music, there’s a lot more creative freedom.
“There’s a lot more acceptance for whatever age you are or who you want to be as an artist. It doesn’t feel as restrictive as when it did when I first maybe entered the industry in 2011.
“And I think that’s really encouraging for me to have watched that evolution in music to get to where I am now.”