After a week of boyband exits, (don’t mention the ‘Z’ word), it’s difficult not to go into Nick Jonas‘ debut solo album with preconceived ideas.

Jonas joked about infamous member exits recently during his gig presenting the Nickelodeon Kids’ Choice Awards. He is, in fact, the second ‘JoBro’ to venture solo – Joe Jonas’ solo album ‘Fastlife’ came and went about as quickly as one would imagine he did when he ditched his purity ring.

One buzzcut and a few rolled t-shirt cuffs later, ‘bad boy’ Nick Jonas comes out of the woodwork with his self-titled debut.

The album’s biggest hit, Jealous is the undisputed earworm of the album, despite some questionable lyrics. “I turn my chin music up/And I’m puffing my chest/I’m getting red in the face/You can call me obsessed …”

Vocally, Jonas has come on leaps and bounds from his boyband days, expressing a maturity and depth unheard of before now … Or so it seems.

With a bassline plucked straight from the Seinfeld, taking tracks like Teacher seriously is hard to say the least. With the right promotion, however, it’s easy to see this being a massive club track with its disco inspired chorus. The music video accompanying the song features half naked models with the lyrics written across their bodies – trying a little too hard to shake the clean-cut Disney image.

Chains begins with lines, “with her wine-stained lips, yeah, she nothing but trouble/cold to the touch but she hot like the devil”. Listening without guffawing becomes a struggle. Obviously, pop music is not exactly known for its ground-breaking lyricism but one would wonder why his co-writers didn’t put a red ring around that clanger. He goes on to rhyme ‘love’ with ‘love’ at the chorus. What had the potential to be a decent pop/R&B track ends up a write off due to a lack of attention to detail.

His collaboration with Angel Haze, Numb, sounds like it could have made the cut for Justin Timberlake’s last album, with an enviable falsetto and structured harmonies. Admittedly, the techno/dance stylings on this seem odd at first. But by the time Haze rap verse comes up, everything ties up nicely.

Pacing goes out the window for Nothing Would Be Better, starting out as a slow burn of catastrophic proportions, then speeding up for the verses, before coming to a screeching halt.

However, on Avalanche – a collaboration with fellow Disney alumni Demi Lovato – Jonas sounds his most comfortable vocally, fully playing the role of R&B smoothie. Vocally, they complement each other wonderfully, with the tightest harmonies on the entire album. Despite this, it’s pretty obvious early on that Demi could have easily handled the song solo – probably with even better results.

It appears Nick Jonas thought five years was enough time to wait before releasing an album post-Jonas Brothers. Perhaps if a certain ex-member of an X-Factor boyband comes looking for advice, he should tell him this – don’t rush it, and don’t do things by half measures. Nick Jonas’ self-titled album is anchored by its lead single, with the rest sounding like rushed, incomplete demos. Poorly produced, with achingly bad lyrics, let’s not rule out a JoBro reunion just yet.