You can’t imagine it, the singer states. There she was preparing for her first album release in eight years, blissfully happy with her current love, and finally the mother of a toddler after facing fertility challenges for ten years, riding high. Suddenly in March she was diagnosed with a breast cancer diagnosis.
The musician, actual name Jessica Cornish, is renowned for being brutally honest. The record, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was intended as an transparent story, tackling every moment of pain she’d endured since she last recorded music (endometrial issues, miscarriage, unsuccessful partnerships, emotional abuse, suicide) with typical candour. The lead track, No Secrets, was released in April. But by then there existed a huge secret. The illness. Later next release, her song Living My Best Life, was released in late spring and she was speaking publicly about how she was living her best life, while at the same time coping with breast cancer. Subsequently she shared the news, and in early July she received surgical treatment.
She shoots me her best “What the fuck?” glance. “I come out with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m conducting every interview, and they inquire, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I’m, like, ‘Well, not much…’” she has just had to postpone shows because she’s awaiting reconstructive surgery.
We’re at a photography studio in London. She is dressed in a tan faux-leather coat, blue jeans with detailed white appliqués, beige footwear and big frames. Picture motorcycle style meets 70s singer aesthetic. “As if I’m in the 1970s and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Easy Rider, I say, recalling the film. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She smiles. Cornish is sharp-witted, bold and blunt. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is aiming for her initial standup show next year. “I love making people laugh. On stage I basically roast the audience.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
The artist was getting ready for an appearance at the ceremony when she noticed an abnormality. “I promptly visited to get it looked at, had an scan, and they were, like, ‘It appears fine; your tissue is healthy.’ And I was, like, ‘But I can feel it. My arm hurts and numbness in my fingers whenever I wake up.’ And they suggested, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ That was 28 March, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The doctor told her if it was concerning she’d call on the start of the week. By then the singer had assured herself it was nothing. The way she tells it, it was just bad timing to get cancer when she had a busy schedule.
“We’re two weeks away from launching this thing after eight years without an album and no new music. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I thought, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I jump on the Zoom thinking it’s all going to be positive, and she says, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ The solemn tone? And she reveals, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your reports have indicated aggressive cancer.’” What was your reaction? “I replied, ‘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 viewed the procedure scary and bizarre. “I hate being put under. You’re escorted. In urgent cases you are wheeled, but now I just strolled down with a gown on and my rear exposed. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, Cornish says, she’s been fortunate. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the op. “It’s terrible, but you know what? I’m grateful it was caught soon. I had the mastectomy four months ago and my affected breast now appears as a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” A further beam. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”
The next operation is for health and appearance. Her boobs, she remarks, are now “asymmetrical. The implant is larger than before. That’s impolite! I thought, why make it worse, I’m already having a rough time. Such disrespect! 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. Illness changed that.”
Previous Struggles
Cornish is familiar with health problems. She believes her outlook on her diagnosis has been so upbeat because she’s used to health crises. They have often coincided with career highs, acting as a reminder, or blow, to highlight not to be complacent. “Frankly, I feel fate says, ‘Things going well? Hold on.’ Since childhood, it has consistently accompanied high points for me; a major or strange event has happened to my health.”
She reminisces to her youth, already beginning performing in the West End in Whistle Down the Wind (she was chosen at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was diagnosed with the cardiac issue Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a tachycardia as well as dizziness and irregular beats. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an intravenous line, and going back into hospital at night.” She fast-forwards six years, and teenage Jess has entered the female band Soul Deep while enrolled in the performing arts school. “I secured a deal, and I had a stroke. Then when I was ready to debut in 2020 I had a automobile accident and my larynx moved up and I lost my voice for a twelve months.”
Hey, I say, slow down, I can’t keep up. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
