Less than three years since their break to focus on solo careers and all members of Little Mix have released singles, all showcasing varying sounds and identities. Leigh-Anne, Perrie and Jade’s artistries have become polarising topics amongst fans of the girl group. Some believe Perrie isn’t parading her vocals as much as they were spotlighted in Little Mix, some believe Jade is the only member to have found her true identity, and others are more partial to the sound of Leigh-Anne and the direction she is heading in. It’s evident that every member has potential vocally to create a remarkable discography, but who is going to realistically achieve this and how?
Leigh-Anne was the first of the three to make her mark as a solo artist with ‘Don’t Say Love’. She promoted it well with interviews and teasers, although I hadn’t listened to it up until a couple months ago. The garage, R&B pop, Craig David-esque single has now amassed over 17.5 million streams on Spotify.
At first I was ambivalent toward ‘Don’t Say Love’, but it is easily the best song Leigh-Anne has released. Her vocal is exactly suited to this genre. It’s commercial and no wonder that it almost reached the top ten in the UK Top 40, peaking at 11. Not longer after, ‘My Love’ featuring Afrosoul singer Ayra Starr was released. Perhaps not something I would listen to like ‘Don’t Say Love’ is, but upbeat and commercial enough. Now moving onto Leigh-Anne’s EP ‘No Hard Feelings’, we see a slight shift to a more R&B, slower-tempo Afrobeat genre. The vocals seem to have found their identity once again, syncing with the sound just right, and this is evident from opening track ‘Stealin’ Love’. However, the melodies aren’t as memorable as ‘Don’t Say Love’ nor ‘My Love’. ‘I’ll Still Be Here’ is probably the best, and I think it would work as a single, but songs like ‘OMG’ and ‘Anticipate’ feel very similar to me. The EP as a whole still works, acting as a cool insight into the direction Leigh-Anne is going in, and I think what happens from here is what matters. She needs time to craft her image, and we should see that begin with her upcoming album.
Perrie was the second to launch her solo career, releasing ‘Forget About Us’ in April. I vaguely remember the promotion for it, hearing the teaser and think it sounded okay. And the melody pretty much met those expectations. It’s a nice, easy listen of a radio hit, but arguably her second single ‘Tears’ would have been a better choice for her debut. ‘Tears’, released in June, possesses a commercially retro sound with an addictively catchy chorus. I’ve heard people say ‘anyone could have sang it’, especially in comparison to ‘Forget About Us’ which brags her powerful vocals. However, I don’t believe this is a problem as long as Perrie’s album experiments with this sound further or she keeps releasing songs just as catchy and becomes a singles kind of artist. Who is to say she can’t experiment with this genre and showcase her vocals simultaneously? What ‘Tears’ has that ‘Forget About Us’ doesn’t is this authenticity which could help Perrie build her image as an artist, and it’s unfortunate that the success of ‘Tears’ is not even one sixth of that of her debut. Somehow, ‘Forget About Us’ has received 22 million streams and ‘Tears’ is struggling after the 3 million mark.
Then Jade waltzed into the music industry once again, with enough confidence to impress over and over again. While she may have only released ‘Angel Of My Dreams’, her S.A.D version was just as sensational as the original, taking her vocals to phenomenal levels.
‘Angel Of My Dreams’ is wrapped up in so much character, enhanced by the music video. It traverses across genres, sounding like Kylie Minogue’s 00s sleek production met Lady Gaga’s versatile 2010s sound and Charli XCX’s bratty 2020s attitude. And yet, it’s establishes itself as ‘so Jade’, with a histrionically perfect pop star music video that represents as such. While some may feel Jade just won’t beat this song, I think it almost confirms that her album is going to be spectacular. ‘Angel of My Dreams’ peaked at 7 on the UK Top 40, and is now lurking around the top 10. It’s the most chart successful of the Little Mix solo singles so far, and it is only her debut.
What I’ve gathered from the Little Mix solo careers so far is that Leigh-Anne has worked out her sound and maybe even her image, but she needs to release more of her commercial songs from ‘No Hard Feelings’ as single, namely ‘I’ll Still Be Here’. Perhaps her record label should give her Mabel 2017-2020 treatment, producing an array of genre diverse singles, radio hit after radio hit. Perrie’s image is a little unclear right now, but she has powerful enough vocals to experiment with different genres and she is likely to find her way in the industry solo eventually because of this. Jade needs to keep doing what she is doing, taking her time to fulfil the anticipation for her album with songs just as brilliant and innovative and as redolent of the last two decades as ‘Angel Of My Dreams’.
You can listen to Leigh-Anne here:
You can listen to Perrie here:
You can listen to JADE here: