You can’t imagine it, the singer states. There she was gearing up for her new album launch in eight years, deeply enamored with her newish partner, and finally the mother of a toddler after struggling to conceive for ten years, on top of the world. Then in March she was told she had a breast cancer diagnosis.
The artist, birth name Jess Cornish, is renowned for speaking her mind. The record, the provocatively titled album, was intended as an transparent story, tackling every bit of hardship she’d faced since she last recorded music (a gynecological condition, miscarriage, failed relationships, gaslighting, suicide) with typical candour. The initial release, her single No Secrets, was released in the spring. But by then there existed a huge secret. The illness. Later follow-up track, her song Living My Best Life, debuted in late spring and she was giving interviews about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while all the while coping with her cancer. Subsequently she shared the news, and in the start of summer she received surgical treatment.
She gives me her best “Seriously?” expression. “I release with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m conducting every press talk, and they ask, ‘What’s happening?’ and I respond, ‘Uh, nothing really’” Cornish has just had to postpone shows because she’s still waiting for reconstructive surgery.
We meet at a studio in London. She is sporting a beige fake-leather jacket, denim trousers with ornate white designs, cream boots and big frames. Picture motorcycle style meets 70s singer aesthetic. “As if I’m in the 1970s and I should have a boyfriend with a big tache.” A biker reference, I say, recalling the picture. “They used to call me that!” She smiles. She is fast-thinking, unfiltered and blunt. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is hoping to make her first comedy performance next year. “I like entertaining. When performing I frequently joke about the crowd.”
Personal Battles and News
The artist was planning an slot at the awards show when she discovered a mass. “I promptly visited to get it looked at, had an ultrasound, and they told me, ‘It appears fine; your tissue is healthy.’ And I insisted, ‘Yet I sense it. My arm hurts and tingling in my hands whenever I rise.’ And they replied, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ 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 start of the week. By then Cornish had convinced herself it was okay. The way she tells it, it was just bad timing to face illness when she had many commitments.
“We’re two weeks away from launching this thing after years away and no new music. And she contacted me and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I assumed, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I log in expecting it’s all going to be good, and she goes, ‘Please take a seat.’ The solemn tone? And she continues, ‘Unfortunately but your biopsy results have come back as aggressive cancer.’” What did you say? “I said, ‘That’s unfortunate. The timing is terrible.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”
Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness
She considered the operation terrifying and absurd. “I fear going under. They lead you. In urgent cases you roll down in a bed, but then I just strolled down with a medical attire and my backside out. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, Cornish says, she’s been fortunate. Without chemo or radio, just the procedure. “Cancer sucks, man, but however Thank fuck I found it early. The surgery happened a few months back and my affected breast now resembles a fruit under fabric.” She smiles again. “At least the nipple remains.”
The subsequent surgery is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her boobs, she observes, are now “asymmetrical. The size doesn’t match. So inconsiderate! I reflected, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a rough time. So rude! It’s funny because I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got perfectionism, and I know they’d never be perfect. Cancer ruined that plan.”
A History of Health Challenges
The singer is familiar with health problems. She believes her perspective on the cancer has been so positive because she’s familiar with health crises. Frequently they align with peak moments, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or blow, to make her recall not to assume everything is fine. “Honestly, I feel life goes, ‘Things going well? Take a seat.’ Ever since I was a child, it has consistently accompanied achievements for me; a serious or unusual issue has impacted my body.”
She takes me back to her youth, already making her debut featuring in the West End in the production (she was cast at the age of nine). That’s when she was found to have the heart condition a syndrome, which can cause a tachycardia 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 half a dozen years, and 17-year-old Jess has become part of the girl group Soul Deep while enrolled in the academy. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was ready to debut in the year 2020 I had a car crash and my voice box shifted and I lost my voice for a year.”
Wow, I say, wait, I need a moment. At just 17? She nods|agrees
