You can’t imagine it, the singer remarks. There she was readying for her new album launch in eight years, ecstatically in love with her recent boyfriend, and at long last the mother of a toddler after facing fertility challenges for ten years, riding high. Then in spring she was told she had breast cancer.
The musician, birth name J. Cornish, is renowned for being brutally honest. The record, her latest release, was supposed to be an transparent story, addressing every bit of hardship she’d endured since she last recorded music (endometriosis, losing a baby, failed relationships, emotional abuse, mental health struggles) with characteristic openness. The first single, No Secrets, was released in the spring. But by then there existed a huge secret. The cancer. Later next release, her song Living My Best Life, was released in late spring and she was giving interviews about how she was living her best life, while still secretly dealing with the disease. A month later she disclosed her condition, and in early July she had a mastectomy.
She shoots me her best “Seriously?” look. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m doing every press talk, and they ask, ‘What’s happening?’ and I’m, like, ‘Uh, nothing really’” Cornish has just had to call off performances because she’s awaiting follow-up surgery.
We meet at a photography studio in the capital. She is dressed in a light brown synthetic jacket, jeans with detailed white appliqués, cream boots and oversized specs. Imagine biker chic meets vintage look. “I feel like I’m in the 1970s and I should have a man with facial hair.” Easy Rider, I say, thinking of the film. “They used to call me that!” She smiles. Jessie is quick, bold and blunt. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is hoping to make her initial standup show soon. “I like entertaining. When performing I basically roast the audience.”
Personal Battles and News
She was getting ready for an slot at the Baftas when she noticed an abnormality. “I promptly visited to get it examined, had an scan, and they told me, ‘It seems benign; your breasts are normal.’ And I was, like, ‘But I can feel it. I’ve got an achy arm and pins and needles in my hands whenever I get up.’ And they replied, ‘We should biopsy it?’ It happened on March 28, the day after my birthday.” It was a Friday. The physician told her if it was bad news she’d reach out on the start of the week. By then she had assured herself it was fine. The way she describes it, it was simply too inconvenient to get cancer when she had so much on.
“It was a fortnight prior from debuting the project after years away and four years without a single. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I assumed, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I join the call expecting it’s all going to be good, and she says, ‘Please take a seat.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she says, ‘Unfortunately but your biopsy results have come back as aggressive cancer.’” What did you say? “I said, ‘Well, that’s not great. The timing is terrible.’ My initial thought was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”
Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness
She viewed the procedure scary and bizarre. “I fear going under. They lead you. In urgent cases you go on a gurney, but now I just walked with a gown on and my backside out. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, Cornish says, she’s been blessed. Without chemo or radio, just the surgery. “It’s terrible, but you know what? Luckily it was detected early. I underwent removal a few months back and my affected breast now looks like a fruit under fabric.” A further beam. “The nipple was preserved.”
The follow-up procedure is for health and appearance. Her boobs, she observes, are now “different sizes. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. So inconsiderate! I reflected, why make it worse, I’m already having a hard period. How offensive! It’s funny because I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be flawless. Cancer ruined that plan.”
Past Medical Issues
Cornish is no stranger to illness. She thinks her perspective on the cancer has been so optimistic because she’s experienced in medical emergencies. Many times they occur alongside professional successes, acting as a reminder, or blow, to remind her not to assume everything is fine. “Frankly, I feel life goes, ‘Things going well? Take a seat.’ From a young age, it has always gone alongside moments of success for me; a serious or unusual issue has happened to my health.”
She takes me back to her 11-year-old self, already starting her career featuring in the stage in Whistle Down the Wind (she was cast at the age of 9). That’s when she was told about the cardiac issue Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as lightheadedness and irregular beats. “I rehearsed between visits on an intravenous line, and being readmitted at night.” She fast-forwards half a dozen years, and teenage Jess has become part of the female band Soul Deep while studying at the Brit School. “I secured a deal, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was about to put out music in 2020 I had a automobile accident and my throat was injured and I couldn’t sing for a year.”
Oi, I say, hold on, I need a moment. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
