Long before Taylor Swift bandied the phrase, “And, baby, that’s show business for you” in honor of her forthcoming album, The Life of a Showgirl, JADE had announced the title of her debut as That’s Showbiz Baby. A record she had started to work on, even in its roughest incarnation, around 2022. Meaning that it took three years for her to finally “birth it out.” A measured decision on her part in that she didn’t want to follow in the footsteps of Little Mix, releasing a record almost every year since 2012 in a bid to “stay relevant.” So it was that she took a little more time to find her own voice as a solo artist, working with everyone from Jodie Harsh to Tove Lo during the process. The result might not necessarily be a “sonically cohesive” album, but it is an album that is uniquely and decidedly “JADE.”
To immediately carve out her solo identity, she kicks off the record with “Angel of My Dreams,” a track that, by now, the masses are well acquainted with. As the first taste of what she was capable of on her own, it revealed that JADE was unafraid to make a daring and meta statement about the industry she can’t help but love despite the way it chews up and spits out pop stars on an almost monthly basis. One day, your “shtick” might be all the rage, and the next it’s not drawing in enough “sales” (whatever that means anymore). As for the haunting use of the Sandie Shaw sample at the beginning of the song, like Addison Rae, JADE has described herself as a “student of pop.” That shines through in manifold ways throughout the record, and it begins with harnessing Shaw’s “Puppet on a String” to commence “Angel of My Dreams.”
As for the love for the music industry that (mostly) outshines the hate on “Angel of My Dreams,” it quickly gives way to outright hate on “IT Girl,” during which JADE (once again) mimics the average suit by urging, all Faustian-like, in the first verse, “Sign on the line for me/Baby, smile, but don’t show your teeth/Say goodbye to autonomy/Now your body belongs to me.” But, whereas the JADE of the early Little Mix days might have been “content” to go along with that oppressive, “do as I say” bit, the JADE of the present bites back, “Kitty got fangs and kitty got claws/Clause in the contract, contract gone/Gone is the girl that you could con, con.”
As if that weren’t enough of a “fuck you” (and not just “for now”), JADE delivers another coup de grâce via the chorus, “I’m not your thing/I’m not your baby doll/No puppet on a string/This bitch can’t be controlled/I’m not, I’m not, I’m not your thing/No puppet on a string.” That “puppet on a string” mention reminding listeners that her Sandie Shaw love didn’t stop with “Angel of My Dreams” (what’s more, “Puppet on a String” is the connection that helps so closely “relate” these two songs to the point where they feel like “companion” pieces—as such, it’s no wonder JADE called “IT Girl” the “cunty little sister” to “Angel of My Dreams”). After all, why waste an opportunity to repeat this metaphor for what it’s so often like to be a pop star? Particularly of the more “manufactured” variety that comes out of shows like The X Factor, which rejected JADE twice when she auditioned before finally accepting her in 2011, placing her in a group that was initially called Rhythmix (the group later changed their name to Little Mix when a music charity based in Brighton with the same name wanted to get legal about it). Incidentally, she wasn’t planning to audition for the third time—it was her older brother that encouraged her to try again. And, were it not for his nudge, JADE would have given up the dream and pursued a degree in theater production “and stuff.”
Luckily for the music industry, the third time was the charm. Though it wasn’t exactly “great” that JADE was just coming off a very vulnerable moment in her life, having recently been discharged from the hospital for her anorexia when she got the news of her acceptance. Indeed, JADE remarked earlier this year, “In retrospect, if the show had done a proper mental health assessment, then they wouldn’t have let me on.” But then, that was probably JADE’s first glimpse into how little “the industry” cares about an artist’s physical or emotional well-being. And so, the shade thrown at The X Factor reaches a peak with the last line of “IT Girl,” “It’s a no from me.”
It’s also a “no” from JADE when it comes to putting up with any bullshit in a relationship, detailing that moment in an argument when one person finally snaps (more than the other) and declares, in no uncertain terms, “Baby, back off out my face right now/Don’t you tell me to calm down/No more words, just ‘fuck you’ for now.” In other words, JADE needs to cool off before she can even think about talking to her bloke again. Especially after all the patience she’s shown him before. Or, as JADE summed it up, “‘FUFN’ is the escalation of an argument we’ve all had, knowing it’s not the end but feeling all the anger in the moment. It’s the channeling of female rage into a badass big pop banger.” As for those speculating as to who inspired the track, surprisingly it wasn’t one of JADE’s exes (e.g., Sam Craske or Jed Elliott), but rather, her current boyfriend, Jordan Stephens (in case you didn’t already know). As JADE tells it, “[The concept] stemmed from actually having a dream about my boyfriend cheating on me and then waking up the next day fuming. So that’s how it kind of began… It’s quite relatable, we’re all guilty of being fiery and arguing and then afterwards being, ‘Maybe, it wasn’t that big of a deal.’”
But during the period when it does feel like a really big fucking deal, it’s only too believable to hear JADE warn, “I’m about to hit you with the worst of me/I don’t want your angry text/I don’t want your sorry sex/I just want you out my fuckin’ face.” Because, yes, every woman, sooner or later, reaches this kind of inevitable breaking point in a relationship—particularly when it’s a long-term one that keeps hitting the same walls without any sign of either party making a change. So it is that those caught in this type of dynamic keep having such flare-ups, often leading to the break up-and-make up pattern (hear also: Sabrina Carpenter’s “We Almost Broke Up Again Last Night”). Perhaps because the thought of “starting over yet again” (to borrow a fake book title from Sex and the City) means having to go through the rigmarole of being jealous of the new person’s ex. This being the very topic that JADE explores on the following track, “Plastic Box.”
And while some might make a certain connection to Olivia Rodrigo’s “Obsessed” (on which she sings, “I’m so obsessed with your ex”), JADE is less focused on the former girlfriend in question (presumably, Amber Anderson) and more on the idea of how her current boyfriend loved someone so vehemently before her. Which is why JADE described the theme as being “about the irrational and toxic insecurity within us when we think about our partner’s previous relationships.” Ergo, her unabashed request, “Can I have your heart in a plastic box?/Never used, fully clean, untouched/Like I’m the only one you’ve ever loved.”
In a way, it’s like the female version of how some guys still bristle over a woman’s sexual history, preferring instead that it’s her vag which remains “fully cleaned, untouched.” In any event, JADE has billed “‘P’ Box” as “one of [her] favorite songs [she’s] ever written.” High praise like that might make one think it would be a very tough act to follow, but no, “Midnight Cowboy” more than delivers (and is, in truth, much more sensual than Selena Gomez and Benny Blanco’s plain “Cowboy” from I Said I Love You First), in no small part thanks to some lyrical contributions from none other than RAYE (everyone’s doing mononyms in all caps nowadays), who also co-wrote “FUFN,” and JADE’s own aforementioned boyfriend, Jordan Stephens. But what really puts the cherry on top (apart from spoken word contributions by Ncuti Gatwa) is the rhythmic bassline—produced by additional co-writers of the song Jonah Christian and Stephen Mykal—that practically oozes the feeling of sweating it out on the dance floor while grinding up against any number of randos (and here, too, another Carpenter song comes to mind: “When Did You Get Hot?”).
With such a sound, the lyrics must accordingly keep up with the sexual tone. So it is that JADE refers to herself as the “ride” for a midnight cowboy (also a film allusion), announcing, “I’m a real wild bitch, yeah, I’m mental/I’m the ride of your life, not a rental/I’m the editor, call me Mr. Enninful.” This being a very specific kind of kink (and for those who didn’t guess, “Mr. Enninful” is Edward Enninful, the former editor-in-chief of British Vogue and the former European editorial director of Condé Nast, Vogue’s “parent” company). To be sure, JADE wants to keep it nothing but kinky as she sings the additional disclaimer, “No vanilla, let’s experimental.” And so, it’s quite possible that not since Ginuwine’s 1996 hit, “Pony,” has a song wielding such strong innuendos about cowboys and rides been this sexy. Complete with such verses as, “I’ma saddle him up, hold him down, I’ma saddle him up/Fantasy, leather chaps on the floor.”
And, speaking of “fantasy,” it’s not only the song that fittingly succeeds “Midnight Cowboy,” but also served as the second single from That’s Showbiz Baby, leaning into the only musical trend more common than country right now: disco. To match the sonic landscape, JADE tapped David LaChappelle to direct the Soul Train-inspired video, during which JADE does her best impression of Diana Ross (who also gets another nod on the album via “Before You Break My Heart”)—though she said it was Donna Summer’s vocal stylings she was trying to channel the most. Granted, Diana Ross gives way to Carrie White (to keep the 70s references coming) by the end of the video. And besides, who but Carrie W. can better understand sentiments like, “Passion, pain/Pleasure, no shame/If you like it weird, I like it strange”? That is, except for Tinashe, who goes into similar territory when she asks, “Is somebody gonna match my freak?” on 2024’s “Nasty.”
Even so, JADE continues to cite Donna Summer (“meets MGMT meets Beth Ditto”) as an influence on the next track, “Unconditional,” which may arguably among the best tracks the album has to offer (which is really saying something considering that each one is a banger). As a love letter to her mother, Norma, who has suffered from lupus for years, JADE promises, “I will hold your hand forever/Even if my heart explodes/Unconditional/I can’t put you back together/But I’ll always love you so.” That phrase about “always loving” something also appearing in “Angel of My Dreams” (“I will always love you and hate you”)—so clearly JADE is occasionally at war with who (and what) she must always love the most. But “Unconditional” makes it apparent that her mother would (probably) win out every time against show business. Especially if JADE’s “Self Saboteur” behavior transferred from her personal life to her professional life.
But no, as “Self Saboteur” is sure to emphasize, JADE has a greater tendency to sabotage a romance than a gig. Maybe that’s why she wastes no time in getting straight to the heart of the matter with her opening announcement, “I’m always fuckin’ it up, self saboteur/I know I’m worthy of love, but I hit and run/I hate when I give up/I don’t get hurt if I hurt you first.” Or, as MARINA (another all caps mononym lover), back when she was Marina and the Diamonds, once said on “How to Be a Heartbreaker,” “Rule number one is that you gotta have fun/But, baby, when you’re done/You gotta be the first to run/Rule number two, just don’t get attached to/Somebody you could lose.”
In addition to some MARINA vibes here, there’s also an air of Selena Gomez, intionation-wise, with the part of the song where she sings, “You’re bringin’ heaven to me” sounding a lot like, “Can’t keep my hands to myself” (the chorus from Gomez’s 2015 single, “Hands to Myself”). As for the rest of the chorus of “Self Saboteur” (which should, in truth, be “Self Saboteuse”), JADE further laments, “Why do I put me through hell?/I’m feelin’ shackled and free/I’m fuckin’ scared, can you tell?” Which is when the Britney Spears influence seems to appear, for there’s no denying that the motif of “Sometimes” is all over this as well (“Sometimes I run, sometimes I hide/Sometimes I’m scared of you/But all I really want is to hold you tight, treat you right/Be with you day and night/Baby, all I need is time”).
JADE’s vulnerable side quickly dissipates as “Self Saboteur” transitions into “Lip Service,” which, in essence, amounts to JADE’s version of Sabrina Carpenter’s “Sugar Talking” (or is it Sabrina Carpenter’s version of “Lip Service” considering JADE co-wrote this song before hers?). With both women talking about the mouths and lips of men in a way that definitely doesn’t pertain to using them for “communication” (because, quelle surprise, JADE is not using the term “lip service” in the conventional sense). Though, of course, communication can be achieved, let’s say, nonverbally. Which is all that both JADE and Carpenter are really asking for, with the former telling her would-be boo, “You know I’m thirsty for a kiss/Give me a picture of your—/You say you never had a vibe like this/So fuck your friends and come and vibe with me instead/In my bed, get ahead/I make my moves on you and then I know you can’t/Take your eyes off me/Let’s get loose, loose, yеah.” Such “sauciness” isn’t entirely helmed by JADE’s mind. She had a bit of help from the one and only Tove Lo, which makes sense considering that Tove is not just a woman who prides herself on oral sex- and sex positive-centric songs, but also a woman with an album called Blue Lips (the feminine version of blue balls). Also serving as co-writers are TimFromTheHouse (Tove’s frequent collaborator), Johan Salomonsson and, once again, MNEK.
So yes, Carpenter is very much being given a run for her money in terms of songs about wanting to be eaten out and lyrics laden with double meanings and innuendos, with “Lip Service” making “Sugar Talking” sound positively chaste by comparison (e.g., “Your sugar talking isn’t working tonight/Put your loving where your mouth is”—because, obviously, she, too, just wants some head).
But perhaps all these “demands” from JADE (and women in general) are what give men a “Headache,” the title of the next track. Something JADE feels inclined to acknowledge as she tells the object of her affection (presumably Stephens), “Headache like a drill inside your brain/Headache ‘cause I’m driving you insane/Most people couldn’t tolerate this/I’m such a headache, but you love me anyway.” Such is the nature of true love (or maybe resigned love, in many instances). As another up-tempo, club-ready track, JADE once more taps into 70s and funk-inspired sounds, with Sabath entirely in charge of the production on it. And, as is typical with just about every JADE song, its tone and musical style changes tack entirely at another point, concluding with a “dream rock” kind of sound as JADE repeats, “You still love me” in a manner that’s less declarative and more like a spell that commands her boyfriend to continue loving her no matter how much of a headache she might be.
Of course, as has been a trend on the record, “Headache” segues into a song that provides an “inverse” kind of theme, with “Natural at Disaster” instead turning the lens of focus onto a boyfriend who sounds like far more of a headache than JADE. And this stems from, as the listener is informed from the get-go, how “it’s hard to love you when you hate yourself/Can’t be there for you without negatively impacting my mental health” and that “tryna fix you made me break myself.” So it is that JADE channels Selena Gomez anew in that she’s effectively telling this man, “I needed to lose you to love me.” Because, a person who doesn’t love themselves usually can’t love someone else (or, as RuPaul likes to say, “If you can’t love yourself, how in the hell you gonna love somebody else?”). Worse still, they tend to transfer their own self-hate to the other person. Starting out calmly, the song crescendos in a big way during the chorus, with JADE serving Billie Eilish on the third verse of “Happier Than Ever” as she sings, “‘Cause you were all snakes, no ladders/You’re happiest when you make me sadder/Tried to help you, but it didn’t matter/You’re a natural at disaster.” Which, one supposes, is better than being the “Queen of Disaster.”
As for the abovementioned Taylor Swift correlation, JADE brings it back to the fore with “Glitch,” which is also the title of track eighteen on the “3am Edition” of Swift’s Midnights. But, unlike, er, Taylor’s version, JADE’s is hardly a love song (nor is it about the irresistibility of going from friends to lovers). In fact, it’s more of a “fuck off to the negative voice inside your head” anthem (in lieu of a “fuck you for now” one). This made all the more apparent by the chorus, “You’re just a glitch/Get out of my head, get out of my fuckin’ skin/You’re telling me liеs, telling me how it is/Sick of you talking to me like I’m your bitch/When I’m that bitch.” To create the effect of a “glitched out” vocal sound, co-producers Lostboy and Inverness give JADE an assist. All in service of emphasizing her intent with the track, which is to do everything in her power to eliminate the “glitch” of negative self-talk. And, as she stated on It’s Out, “It’s actually me just talking to myself, like, gettin’ in my own head, which I sometimes do, I’m sure everyone’s been there where you kind of have a bit of an imposter syndrome, so that song is basically me having a go at myself like, ‘Stop it. Stop doing that to yourself.’” Indeed, this is the type of “bop” that Charli XCX and Lorde could get on board with.
Though not so much the more disco-fied dance aura of “Before You Break My Heart,” yet another standout of That’s Showbiz Baby. As well as a track that persists in proving just how serious JADE is about pop music history, in all its forms. For The Supremes can easily be considered one of the first “girl groups,” long before the likes of Little Mix entered the fray. And so, tapping into her inner Diana Ross energy (just as she did for the “Fantasy” video), JADE pleads, “You’re the dream that I’ve had for so long/You’re the one who inspired all my love songs/And now you’rе tryin’ to leave/It’s a crime to mе, call the love police/You keep hurting me, I’m beggin’ you to/Stop!/In the name of love/Before you break my heart.”
To play up the notion of That’s Showbiz Baby tapping into all the different “Jades” that have existed in order to make this one rise from the ashes, Sabath repurposed a home video of JADE singing The Supremes’ hit for a talent show when she was a child to use for the famed chorus, now as rendered by JADE. Something that she rightly felt was “really special,” as she told NME, and how, as a result, it’s also clear that “the song’s about me sort of not forgetting my younger self and how, like, far we’ve come together, not losing sight of that in this showbiz world.”
Not to mention how far she’s come as a “student of pop.” And, as any such person knows, it’s always best to round out an album with a slow jam like “Silent Disco,” which comes across as an unvarnished love song to Stephens. Embodying the same kind of breathy vocals as FKA Twigs, JADE informs her “special someone,” “Oh, when you make love to me/With a passion, blow the roof off/Baby, these stars are blushing.” This before diving into a chorus that speaks to how, so often, the language between two lovers is arcane, as though they’re dancing to music that others simply can’t hear. This conveyed by JADE pronouncing, “And it’s our private party/Might look a little stupid to them, but to us, it’s something/And I love it/Our silent disco, we madе.” Naturally, there are some who might still to interpret it as being about her relationship with her fans. A dynamic that’s only bound to intensify now that her debut record is out, chronicling the life of a showgirl in all its lurid detail.
