You wouldn’t believe it, the singer remarks. At that moment gearing up for her comeback record in nearly a decade, deeply enamored with her newish partner, and at long last the parent to a young child after facing fertility challenges for ten years, on top of the world. Suddenly in spring she was found to have cancer in her breast.
The musician, real name Jess Cornish, is famous for telling it as it is. The LP, the provocatively titled album, was supposed to be an transparent story, dealing with every moment of pain she’d faced since she last made an album (endometrial issues, pregnancy loss, broken romances, gaslighting, mental health struggles) with characteristic openness. The first single, No Secrets, was launched in the spring. But by then there existed a huge secret. The cancer. Then second single, Living My Best Life, came out in May and she was giving interviews about how she was living her best life, while still secretly coping with breast cancer. A month later she shared the news, and in early July she underwent breast removal surgery.
She gives me her best “Seriously?” look. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m doing every press talk, and they inquire, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I respond, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” the singer has just had to call off performances because she’s still waiting for follow-up surgery.
We meet at a studio in the capital. She is wearing a tan faux-leather coat, jeans with detailed white appliqués, cream boots and big frames. Think biker chic meets 70s singer aesthetic. “I feel like I’m in the seventies and I should have a partner with a mustache.” A biker reference, I say, recalling the picture. “They used to call me that!” She grins. Jessie is fast-thinking, bold and filter-free. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is aiming for her standup debut soon. “I love making people laugh. When performing I basically roast the audience.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
She was getting ready for an performance at the awards show when she discovered a mass. “I promptly visited to get it checked, had an scan, and they were, like, ‘It appears fine; your breasts are normal.’ And I insisted, ‘However, it’s there. My arm hurts and numbness in my fingers whenever I wake up.’ And they replied, ‘We should biopsy it?’ That was 28 March, the following my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The doctor told her if it was concerning she’d reach out on the Monday. By then the singer had convinced herself it was fine. The way she tells it, it was inopportune to face illness when she had a busy schedule.
“We’re two weeks away from debuting the project after eight years without an album 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 join the call believing it’s all going to be fine, and she goes, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she says, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your reports have shown malignant cells.’” What was your reaction? “I said, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. The timing is terrible.’ Immediately I felt 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 considered the operation terrifying and absurd. “I hate being put under. They walk you down. In urgent cases you are wheeled, but this time I just marched with a hospital gown and my rear exposed. Like a dystopian scene.” But, she adds, she’s been lucky. Without chemo or radio, just the procedure. “Cancer sucks, man, but yet Thank fuck I found it early. I had the mastectomy four months ago and my one side now resembles a odd shape.” Another grin. “The nipple was preserved.”
The follow-up procedure is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her breasts, she observes, are now “different sizes. The implant is larger than before. That’s impolite! I felt, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a rough time. How offensive! Ironically I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be ideal. Illness changed that.”
A History of Health Challenges
Cornish is familiar with health problems. She feels her attitude toward illness has been so upbeat because she’s used to physical challenges. Frequently they align with peak moments, functioning as a wake-up call, or punch in the stomach, to remind her not to take anything for granted. “Honestly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘Enjoying yourself? Take a seat.’ From a young age, it has often paired with high points for me; a major or strange event has happened to my health.”
She reminisces to her 11-year-old self, already making her debut featuring in the West End in the production (she was chosen at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was told about the cardiac issue a syndrome, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as vertigo and irregular beats. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an drip, and going back into hospital at night.” She skips forward several years, and young Jessica has joined the trio Soul Deep while attending the Brit School. “I secured a deal, and I had a stroke. Then when I was planning to release songs in recently I had a collision and my throat was injured and I was unable to vocalize for a twelve months.”
Oi, I say, wait, I am overwhelmed. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
