The thing is, JADE has all the ingredients an artist needs for solo success. She's got a confident new look. Her songs are genuinely creative for the pop sphere, while still being the type of pop banger you can sing along to in the shower. Just like Chappell Roan. Her songs are loaded with earworm hooks, and she's got a classic diva belt. She's released videos that are fun and full of eye-catching visuals. She had a much-praised performance at the BRIT Awards, which brought her to a lot of people's attention. And I haven't even mentioned the inbuilt audience she'll have from her years in Little Mix.
It should all be working for her, but somehow, she adds up to less than the sum of her parts. For some reason, audiences aren't buying in. Not at the scale they should be. I suspect it is the drag connection that's been putting people off. She thinks she's Lady Gaga circa Born This Way - but even Gaga has pulled back on the trans schtick, as far as I know.
Someone please correct me if I'm wrong, but as far as I know, Gaga mostly pays lip service to the TQ these days, and focuses on putting out pop bangers with that classic avant garde Gaga aesthetic instead. If Gaga ever pulled a stunt like this at a UK concert, she'd take a hit for it. And I think either she or her people know that. She's an icon of pop, and I don't think she really wants to throw it all away and burn herself up on the altar of trans. She wants to be the kind of artist who is beloved by the gays, but can still put out a ballad with Bruno Mars and gets millions of streams from straight fans.
Which is the sensible approach. I don't what's happening in the entertainment industry right now, that so many people seem to have forgotten this basic fact. If you want to be a superstar, you need a broad appeal. You can have a wildly different look, but there has to be a sense that you're inviting your fans in. Whether that's putting themselves in your character's shoes in a movie, or coming along to dance at your show. If you want people to give you their time and money, you extend an invitation and you make them feel welcome. You don't insult large swathes of your audience and tell them to fuck off. All that does is communicate that you don't respect them enough to even try and understand their point of view. You're happy to write them off as caricatures of evil and insult them - in the assumption they'll be so desperate to be in your club, they'll change themselves rather than leave. These celebrities are then so stunned and panicked when fans turn around and walk instead 🤨
I don't know if they're to blame or their management are failing them, but the whole thing has to change. People are setting their careers on fire because they can't read the room. They think Twitter is reality, and they don't realise just how quickly an audience can get the ick. David Tennant learned this the hard way, and Pedro Pascal is about to. But it applies to female artists too, who don't respect that their audience is mostly composed of normie women. We can and will drop you if you disrespect us.
If you can't say something nice, say nothing. And if you can't say nothing, don't be surprised when people stop paying to hear you.
This really does feel like the missing piece to me, that explains why JADE is struggling. Stupid, stupid move. If her management had any sense, they'd be furious.