You wouldn’t believe it, the singer states. At that moment gearing up for her comeback record in nearly a decade, deeply enamored with her current love, and finally the parent to a young child after struggling to conceive for a decade, feeling invincible. Suddenly in March she was told she had breast cancer.
The musician, birth name Jess Cornish, is renowned for telling it as it is. The LP, her latest release, was supposed to be an transparent story, dealing with every ounce of devastation she’d faced since she last recorded music (a gynecological condition, losing a baby, failed relationships, gaslighting, mental health struggles) with her usual frankness. The first single, the song No Secrets, was launched in the spring. But by then there was a mighty secret. Her diagnosis. Then follow-up track, Living My Best Life, was released in late spring and the artist was giving interviews about how she was living her best life, while at the same time coping with breast cancer. A month later she shared the news, and in the start of summer she had a mastectomy.
She gives me her best “Are you kidding?” glance. “I release with a song called No Secrets. I’m conducting every press talk, and they inquire, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I answer, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” she has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s yet to undergo follow-up surgery.
We’re at a studio in the capital. She is dressed in a beige fake-leather jacket, jeans with detailed white appliqués, beige footwear and large glasses. Imagine motorcycle style meets 70s singer aesthetic. “It seems like I’m in the 1970s and I should have a man with facial hair.” A biker reference, I say, recalling the picture. “They used to call me that!” She smiles. Cornish is fast-thinking, irreverent and blunt. She says she has always been interested in humor and is planning to attempt her first comedy performance next year. “I enjoy humor. During performances I basically roast the fans.”
Health Struggles and Diagnosis
Cornish was getting ready for an appearance at the ceremony when she found a lump. “I immediately went to get it checked, had an scan, and they said, ‘It seems benign; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I was, like, ‘Yet I sense it. I have arm pain and numbness in my fingers whenever I get up.’ And they replied, ‘How about a biopsy?’ It happened on March 28, the day after my birthday.” It was a Friday. The physician told her if it was concerning she’d contact on the start of the week. By then Cornish had persuaded herself it was fine. The way she tells it, it was inopportune to get cancer when she had many commitments.
“Just two weeks before from releasing the album after a long hiatus and no new music. And she contacted me and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I thought, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I join the call believing it’s all going to be fine, and she goes, ‘You might want to sit.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she says, ‘I regret to inform you but your test results have indicated malignant cells.’” What was your reaction? “I said, ‘Well, that’s not great. The timing is terrible.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘My child depends on me.’”
Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness
She viewed the procedure scary and bizarre. “I fear going under. They lead you. In urgent cases you are wheeled, but this time I just walked with a gown on and my bum hanging out. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, Cornish says, she’s been fortunate. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the procedure. “It’s terrible, but you know what? I’m grateful it was caught soon. I had the mastectomy four months ago and my one side now appears as a fruit under fabric.” A further beam. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”
The follow-up procedure is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her boobs, she notes, are now “asymmetrical. The implant is larger than before. How rude! I felt, no need to bully me, I’m already having a hard period. So rude! Ironically I said I’d never get my boobs done because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be flawless. Illness changed that.”
Previous Struggles
Cornish is no stranger to illness. She thinks her perspective on the cancer has been so optimistic because she’s experienced in physical challenges. Frequently they align with career highs, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or blow, to highlight not to assume everything is fine. “Honestly, I feel fate says, ‘Enjoying yourself? Sit down.’ Ever since I was a child, it has always gone alongside moments of success for me; a major or strange event has happened to my health.”
She recalls to her youth, already starting her career performing in the West End in the production (she was selected at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was found to have the cardiac issue WPW, which can cause a tachycardia as well as vertigo and heart flutters. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an IV drip, and going back into hospital at night.” She jumps ahead half a dozen years, and young Jessica has become part of the girl group the group while enrolled in the Brit School. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a stroke. Then when I was ready to debut in the year 2020 I had a automobile accident and my voice box shifted and I lost my voice for a year.”
Oi, I say, wait, I can’t keep up. At just 17? She nods|agrees
