You couldn’t make it up, the singer remarks. At that moment preparing for her comeback record in nearly a decade, deeply enamored with her current love, and finally the parent to a young child after facing fertility challenges for a decade, riding high. Suddenly in March she was diagnosed with a breast cancer diagnosis.
The artist, birth name Jessica Cornish, is known for telling it as it is. The record, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was supposed to be an candid account, tackling every ounce of devastation she’d endured since she last recorded music (a gynecological condition, pregnancy loss, failed relationships, gaslighting, suicide) with typical candour. The lead track, the song No Secrets, was launched in the spring. But by then there existed a huge secret. The illness. Later follow-up track, Living My Best Life, was released in late spring and she was giving interviews about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while at the same time coping with the disease. Four weeks after she disclosed her condition, and in July she underwent breast removal surgery.
She shoots me her best “Seriously?” look. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m conducting every press talk, and they’re, like, ‘What’s happening?’ and I answer, ‘Well, not much…’” she has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s awaiting cosmetic procedures.
Our interview takes place at a studio in London. She is sporting a light brown synthetic jacket, denim trousers with ornate white designs, off-white boots and oversized specs. Picture rocker vibe meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “As if I’m in the 70s and I should have a boyfriend with a big tache.” A biker reference, I say, thinking of the film. “That’s what people called me at school!” She beams. She is quick, irreverent and blunt. She says she has always been interested in humor and is hoping to make her standup debut next year. “I love making people laugh. When performing I frequently joke about the crowd.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
She was getting ready for an performance at the awards show when she noticed an abnormality. “I quickly sought to get it examined, had an scan, and they were, like, ‘It appears fine; your tissue is healthy.’ And I responded, ‘However, it’s there. My arm hurts and pins and needles in my hands whenever I wake up.’ And they said, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ It happened on March 28, the post-birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The physician told her if it was concerning she’d call on the Monday. By then she had assured herself it was fine. The way she describes it, it was just bad timing to get cancer when she had a busy schedule.
“We’re two weeks away from releasing the album after years away and four years without a single. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I assumed, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I log in thinking it’s all going to be good, and she goes, ‘Please take a seat.’ That sympathetic voice? And she says, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your biopsy results have indicated aggressive cancer.’” What did you say? “I said, ‘Well, that’s not great. That’s not fucking great timing.’ My initial thought was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She viewed the procedure terrifying and absurd. “I hate being put under. They lead you. In urgent cases you are wheeled, but now I just strolled down with a medical attire and my bum hanging out. Like a dystopian scene.” But, Cornish says, she’s been blessed. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the surgery. “It’s terrible, but however I’m grateful it was caught soon. I underwent removal four months ago and my one side now appears as a odd shape.” A further beam. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”
The next operation is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her breasts, she remarks, are now “asymmetrical. The implant is larger than before. That’s impolite! I felt, why make it worse, I’m already having a hard period. How offensive! Ironically I said I’d never get my boobs done because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be ideal. Illness changed that.”
Previous Struggles
The singer is familiar with health problems. She believes her perspective on the cancer has been so upbeat because she’s experienced in health crises. They have often coincided with peak moments, acting as a reminder, or shock, to make her recall not to take anything for granted. “Frankly, I feel fate says, ‘You having a good time? Take a seat.’ Since childhood, it has consistently accompanied moments of success for me; a major or strange event has impacted my body.”
She recalls to her 11-year-old self, already making her debut starring in the London theater in a musical (she was cast at the age of 9). That’s when she was told about the heart condition Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as vertigo and palpitations. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an intravenous line, and being readmitted at night.” She jumps ahead several years, and teenage Jess has become part of the female band the group while attending the Brit School. “I secured a deal, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was planning to release songs in recently I had a automobile accident and my voice box shifted and I couldn’t sing for a long period.”
Hey, I say, hold on, I need a moment. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
