You couldn’t make it up, the singer says. There she was gearing up for her first album release in nearly a decade, ecstatically in love with her newish partner, and finally the mother of a toddler after struggling to conceive for a decade, riding high. Suddenly in March she was diagnosed with breast cancer.
The artist, actual name Jessica Cornish, is renowned for telling it as it is. The album, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was supposed to be an candid account, dealing with every moment of pain she’d endured since she last recorded music (endometriosis, pregnancy loss, unsuccessful partnerships, emotional abuse, mental health struggles) with typical candour. The lead track, her single No Secrets, was dropped in the spring. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. Her diagnosis. Then follow-up track, her song Living My Best Life, was released in May and Cornish was giving interviews about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while still secretly living with breast cancer. Four weeks after she went public, and in July she received surgical treatment.
She gives me her best “Seriously?” look. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m doing every media appearance, and they’re, like, ‘Any updates?’ and I respond, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” the singer has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s awaiting cosmetic procedures.
Our interview takes place at a photo studio in London. She is dressed in a tan faux-leather coat, denim trousers with ornate white designs, cream boots and big frames. Imagine rocker vibe meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “As if I’m in the 1970s and I should have a boyfriend with a big tache.” Like the film, I say, recalling the movie. “They used to call me that!” She grins. Jessie is sharp-witted, bold and filter-free. She says she has always been interested in humor and is aiming for her first comedy performance next year. “I like entertaining. On stage I basically roast the fans.”
Health Struggles and Diagnosis
The artist was planning an appearance at the ceremony when she discovered a mass. “I immediately went to get it looked at, had an scan, and they were, like, ‘It appears fine; your breasts are normal.’ And I insisted, ‘However, it’s there. My arm hurts and tingling in my hands whenever I wake up.’ And they said, ‘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 bad news she’d reach out on the Monday. By then the singer had convinced herself it was okay. The way she tells it, it was inopportune to face illness when she had so much on.
“We’re two weeks away from debuting the project after eight years without an album and four years without a single. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I assumed, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I jump on the Zoom expecting it’s all going to be good, and she goes, ‘Please take a seat.’ The solemn tone? And she says, ‘I regret to inform you but your reports have come back as malignant cells.’” What was your reaction? “I answered, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. That’s not fucking great timing.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She found the surgery terrifying and absurd. “I dislike anesthesia. They walk you down. During crises you roll down in a bed, but this time I just marched with a hospital gown and my backside out. It felt surreal.” But, Cornish says, she’s been lucky. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the op. “It’s terrible, but you know what? I’m grateful it was caught soon. I underwent removal recently and my right breast now resembles a odd shape.” She smiles again. “At least the nipple remains.”
The follow-up procedure is for health and appearance. Her breasts, she remarks, are now “uneven. The size doesn’t match. So inconsiderate! I thought, why make it worse, I’m already having a hard period. Such disrespect! Amusingly I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be perfect. Illness changed that.”
Previous Struggles
Cornish is no stranger to illness. She believes her perspective on the cancer has been so optimistic because she’s used to health crises. Frequently they align with peak moments, acting as a reminder, or shock, to highlight not to be complacent. “Honestly, I feel life goes, ‘Enjoying yourself? Sit down.’ From a young age, it has always gone alongside achievements for me; a serious or unusual issue has impacted my body.”
She recalls to her childhood, already making her debut performing in the stage in the production (she was cast at the age of nine). That’s when she was diagnosed with the heart condition Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as lightheadedness and heart flutters. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an intravenous line, and going back into hospital at night.” She skips forward several years, and teenage Jess has become part of the girl group Soul Deep while enrolled in the academy. “I secured a deal, and I had a stroke. Then when I was ready to debut in 2020 I had a automobile accident and my larynx moved up and I lost my voice for a long period.”
Hey, I say, slow down, I am overwhelmed. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
