You can’t imagine it, the singer says. There she was preparing for her comeback record in nearly a decade, deeply enamored with her newish partner, and finally the parent to a young child after facing fertility challenges for a decade, feeling invincible. Then in March she was diagnosed with breast cancer.
The artist, birth name Jess Cornish, is known for speaking her mind. The LP, the provocatively titled album, was meant as an candid account, addressing every moment of pain she’d endured since she last recorded music (a gynecological condition, miscarriage, unsuccessful partnerships, gaslighting, mental health struggles) with characteristic openness. The initial release, the song No Secrets, was dropped in the spring. But by then there was a mighty secret. The cancer. Then next release, her song Living My Best Life, came out in late spring and the artist was speaking publicly about how she was thriving, while all the while coping with her cancer. Four weeks after she went public, and in July she underwent breast removal surgery.
She offers me her best “Are you kidding?” expression. “I come out with a song called No Secrets. I’m giving every press talk, and they’re, like, ‘What’s happening?’ and I respond, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” she has just had to postpone shows because she’s still waiting for reconstructive surgery.
Our interview takes place at a photography studio in London. She is wearing a tan faux-leather coat, jeans with elaborate white patches, beige footwear and large glasses. Imagine rocker vibe meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “It seems like I’m in the 70s and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Like the film, I say, recalling the film. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She beams. Jessie is quick, irreverent and direct. She says she has always wanted to try comedy and is hoping to make her initial standup show next year. “I like entertaining. When performing I basically roast the audience.”
Personal Battles and News
Cornish was planning an slot at the ceremony when she found a lump. “I promptly visited to get it examined, had an scan, and they said, ‘It appears fine; your breasts are normal.’ And I was, like, ‘However, it’s there. My arm hurts and pins and needles in my hands whenever I get up.’ And they suggested, ‘How about a biopsy?’ The date was March 28, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The doctor told her if it was bad news she’d reach out on the Monday. By then Cornish had persuaded herself it was nothing. The way she explains it, it was just bad timing to face illness when she had so much on.
“We’re two weeks away from launching this thing after years away and no new music. And she contacted me and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I assumed, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I log in thinking it’s all going to be positive, and she says, ‘You might want to sit.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she reveals, ‘Unfortunately but your reports have come back as high-grade cancer cells.’” How did you respond? “I answered, ‘That’s unfortunate. What awful timing.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”
Men have called me difficult because I’m a strong person who understands who I am
She found the surgery frightening and surreal. “I hate being put under. They lead you. In urgent cases you go on a gurney, but this time I just strolled down with a hospital gown and my bum hanging out. It felt surreal.” But, she notes, she’s been blessed. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the op. “Cancer sucks, man, but you know what? Thank fuck I found it early. I underwent removal four months ago and my one side now looks like a odd shape.” Another grin. “At least the nipple remains.”
The next operation is for health and appearance. Her breasts, she notes, are now “asymmetrical. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. How rude! I thought, no need to bully me, I’m already having a hard period. How offensive! Amusingly I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got perfectionism, and I know they’d never be ideal. Illness changed that.”
Past Medical Issues
Cornish is accustomed to medical issues. She believes her attitude toward illness has been so upbeat because she’s familiar with physical challenges. They have often coincided with career highs, acting as a reminder, or blow, to highlight not to be complacent. “Truly, I feel life goes, ‘You having a good time? Sit down.’ From a young age, it has often paired with achievements for me; a major or strange event has affected my well-being.”
She takes me back to her childhood, already making her debut starring in the London theater in Whistle Down the Wind (she was chosen at the age of nine). That’s when she was found to have the heart condition Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as lightheadedness and palpitations. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an intravenous line, and returning to the hospital at night.” She skips forward several years, and teenage Jess has become part of the girl group Soul Deep while studying at the academy. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a stroke. Then when I was about to put out music in recently I had a automobile accident and my throat was injured and I couldn’t sing for a long period.”
Oi, I say, hold on, I am overwhelmed. At just 17? She nods|agrees
