You can’t imagine it, the singer remarks. At that moment gearing up for her new album launch in nearly a decade, deeply enamored with her recent boyfriend, and at long last the mom to a little one after facing fertility challenges for a decade, riding high. Then in spring she was told she had breast cancer.
The musician, actual name Jess Cornish, is renowned for speaking her mind. The LP, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was supposed to be an open book, dealing with every ounce of devastation she’d experienced since she last recorded music (a gynecological condition, pregnancy loss, broken romances, emotional abuse, mental health struggles) with typical candour. The first single, her single No Secrets, was launched in April. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. Her diagnosis. Later second single, Living My Best Life, debuted in late spring and she was speaking publicly about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while all the while coping with the disease. A month later she shared the news, and in the start of summer she received surgical treatment.
She offers me her best “Seriously?” glance. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m giving every media appearance, and they inquire, ‘What’s happening?’ and I respond, ‘Well, not much…’” Cornish has just had to call off performances because she’s still waiting for follow-up surgery.
We meet at a studio in London. She is dressed in a tan faux-leather coat, blue jeans with detailed white appliqués, cream boots and large glasses. Think rocker vibe meets vintage look. “I feel like I’m in the seventies and I should have a man with facial hair.” Like the film, I say, recalling the picture. “That’s what people called me at school!” She grins. Jessie is fast-thinking, bold and filter-free. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is planning to attempt her first comedy performance next year. “I enjoy humor. When performing I basically roast the audience.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
The artist was planning an slot at the ceremony when she discovered a mass. “I quickly sought to get it looked at, had an test, and they told me, ‘It looks like nothing; your breasts are normal.’ And I was, like, ‘However, it’s there. My arm hurts and pins and needles in my hands whenever I wake up.’ And they said, ‘How about a biopsy?’ The date was March 28, the following my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The doctor told her if it was serious she’d contact on the start of the week. By then Cornish had convinced herself it was nothing. The way she explains it, it was inopportune to get cancer when she had many commitments.
“We’re two weeks away from releasing the album after eight years without an album and no new music. And she [the doctor] texted 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 believing it’s all going to be good, and she says, ‘Please take a seat.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she continues, ‘Unfortunately but your reports have shown aggressive cancer.’” How did you respond? “I said, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. The timing is terrible.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘My child depends on me.’”
Men have called me difficult because I’m a strong person who understands who I am
She considered the operation terrifying and absurd. “I dislike anesthesia. You’re escorted. During crises you go on a gurney, but now I just strolled down with a medical attire and my bum hanging out. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, Cornish says, she’s been fortunate. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the op. “Cancer sucks, man, but you know what? I’m grateful it was caught soon. I underwent removal recently and my right breast now appears as a fruit under fabric.” A further beam. “At least the nipple remains.”
The next operation is both medical and cosmetic. Her breasts, she observes, are now “uneven. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. So inconsiderate! I felt, why make it worse, I’m already having a difficult experience. So rude! It’s funny because I said I’d never get my boobs done because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be ideal. My plans were disrupted.”
A History of Health Challenges
Cornish is accustomed to medical issues. She feels her perspective on the cancer has been so upbeat because she’s familiar with health crises. Many times they occur alongside professional successes, functioning as a wake-up call, or blow, to remind her not to assume everything is fine. “Truly, I feel life goes, ‘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 youth, already beginning featuring in the stage in Whistle Down the Wind (she was chosen at the age of nine). That’s when she was told about the medical problem WPW, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as vertigo and palpitations. “I rehearsed between visits on an IV drip, and returning to the hospital at night.” She fast-forwards six years, and teenage Jess has joined the trio Soul Deep while enrolled in the performing arts school. “I just got my first record deal, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was about to put out music in recently I had a collision and my throat was injured and I was unable to vocalize for a long period.”
Hey, I say, hold on, I need a moment. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
