You wouldn’t believe it, the singer says. At that moment readying for her first album release in nearly a decade, blissfully happy with her current love, and finally the mom to a little one after facing fertility challenges for a decade, feeling invincible. Suddenly in spring she was found to have cancer in her breast.
The singer-songwriter, actual name Jess Cornish, is renowned for telling it as it is. The LP, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was intended as an open book, addressing every bit of hardship she’d faced since she last worked on songs (endometriosis, miscarriage, unsuccessful partnerships, psychological manipulation, suicide) with typical candour. The lead track, No Secrets, was dropped in April. But by then there was a mighty secret. Her diagnosis. Later next release, the upbeat Living My Best Life, came out in late spring and Cornish was speaking publicly about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while still secretly dealing with the disease. Four weeks after she disclosed her condition, and in early July she received surgical treatment.
She gives me her best “Are you kidding?” glance. “I come out with a song called No Secrets. I’m doing every interview, and they’re, like, ‘Any updates?’ and I’m, like, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” she has just had to call off performances because she’s still waiting for cosmetic procedures.
We’re at a photography studio in the capital. She is sporting a tan faux-leather coat, denim trousers with elaborate white patches, off-white boots and big frames. Think rocker vibe meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “It seems like I’m in the seventies and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Like the film, I say, recalling the picture. “That’s what people called me at school!” She beams. Jessie is quick, bold and filter-free. She says she has always wanted to try comedy and is hoping to make her initial standup show in the coming year. “I enjoy humor. On stage I frequently joke about the fans.”
Personal Battles and News
Cornish was preparing for an appearance at the Baftas when she discovered a mass. “I quickly sought to get it examined, had an ultrasound, and they told me, ‘It looks like nothing; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I responded, ‘Yet I sense it. I have arm pain and numbness in my fingers whenever I get up.’ And they replied, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ It happened on March 28, the day after my birthday.” It was a Friday. The physician told her if it was serious she’d reach out on the start of the week. By then the singer had assured herself it was fine. The way she tells it, it was simply too inconvenient to receive a diagnosis when she had so much on.
“We’re two weeks away from debuting the project after a long hiatus and no new music. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I was, like, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I join the call thinking it’s all going to be fine, and she informs me, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she continues, ‘I regret to inform you but your reports have come back as aggressive cancer.’” What did you say? “I answered, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. That’s not fucking great timing.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘My child depends on me.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She found the surgery frightening and surreal. “I fear going under. You’re escorted. You know when you have emergency surgery you are wheeled, but this time I just strolled down with a gown on and my backside out. Like a dystopian scene.” But, she adds, she’s been lucky. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the procedure. “Cancer sucks, man, but yet Thank fuck I found it early. I underwent removal a few months back and my right breast now looks like a fruit under fabric.” She smiles again. “The nipple was preserved.”
The follow-up procedure is for health and appearance. Her breasts, she notes, are now “asymmetrical. The size doesn’t match. So inconsiderate! I thought, no need to bully me, I’m already having a difficult experience. Such disrespect! Amusingly I said I’d never get my boobs done because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be flawless. Cancer ruined that plan.”
A History of Health Challenges
She is no stranger to illness. She believes her outlook on her diagnosis has been so optimistic because she’s used to physical challenges. They have often coincided with career highs, acting as a reminder, or blow, to remind her not to be complacent. “Truly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘Enjoying yourself? Hold on.’ Ever since I was a child, it has always gone alongside achievements for me; something severe or obscure has impacted my body.”
She reminisces to her youth, already making her debut featuring in the London theater in Whistle Down the Wind (she was cast at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was found to have the heart condition Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as dizziness and heart flutters. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an intravenous line, and being readmitted at night.” She jumps ahead several years, and 17-year-old Jess has joined the female band Soul Deep while enrolled in the performing arts school. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was about to put out music in the year 2020 I had a collision and my throat was injured and I was unable to vocalize for a twelve months.”
Hey, I say, slow down, I need a moment. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
