You couldn’t make it up, the singer remarks. There she was gearing up for her comeback record in eight years, blissfully happy with her current love, and at long last the mom to a little one after dealing with conception issues for ten years, riding high. Suddenly in March she was found to have cancer in her breast.
The singer-songwriter, real name J. Cornish, is renowned for telling it as it is. The album, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was meant as an transparent story, dealing with every ounce of devastation she’d experienced since she last recorded music (a gynecological condition, miscarriage, unsuccessful partnerships, gaslighting, suicide) with characteristic openness. The initial release, the song No Secrets, was launched in April. But by then there existed a huge secret. Her diagnosis. Later next release, the upbeat Living My Best Life, debuted in late spring and Cornish was talking to press about how she was living her best life, while still secretly coping with breast cancer. Four weeks after she shared the news, and in early July she had a mastectomy.
She gives me her best “Seriously?” look. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m giving every media appearance, and they ask, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I respond, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” the singer has just had to call off performances because she’s awaiting reconstructive surgery.
Our interview takes place at a photo studio in London. She is wearing a beige fake-leather jacket, jeans with ornate white designs, cream boots and large glasses. Picture rocker vibe meets 70s singer aesthetic. “It seems like I’m in the 70s and I should have a boyfriend with a big tache.” Like the film, I say, referencing the picture. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She grins. Jessie is sharp-witted, irreverent and direct. She says she has always wanted to try comedy and is aiming for her initial standup show soon. “I enjoy humor. During performances I frequently joke about the crowd.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
The artist was preparing for an slot at the awards show when she noticed an abnormality. “I quickly sought to get it examined, had an test, and they were, like, ‘It appears fine; your breasts are normal.’ And I insisted, ‘Yet I sense it. I’ve got an achy arm and tingling in my hands whenever I get up.’ And they suggested, ‘We should biopsy it?’ That was 28 March, the day after my birthday.” It was a Friday. The specialist told her if it was serious she’d reach out on the start of the week. By then she had convinced herself it was nothing. The way she explains it, it was inopportune to get cancer when she had a busy schedule.
“Just two weeks before 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 was, like, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I join the call expecting it’s all going to be positive, and she goes, ‘You might want to sit.’ The solemn tone? And she says, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your test results have come back as high-grade cancer cells.’” How did you respond? “I replied, ‘That’s unfortunate. What awful timing.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She viewed the procedure scary and bizarre. “I fear going under. They lead you. You know when you have emergency surgery you go on a gurney, but then I just marched with a medical attire and my bum hanging out. It felt surreal.” But, she adds, she’s been fortunate. Without chemo or radio, just the surgery. “Cancer sucks, man, but yet Thank fuck I found it early. I had the mastectomy four months ago and my right breast now looks like a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” Another grin. “At least the nipple remains.”
The subsequent surgery is both medical and cosmetic. Her breasts, she remarks, are now “different sizes. The implant is larger than before. So inconsiderate! I reflected, why make it worse, I’m already having a rough time. How offensive! Amusingly I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got perfectionism, and I know they’d never be flawless. Illness changed that.”
Past Medical Issues
The singer is familiar with health problems. She thinks her outlook on her diagnosis has been so optimistic because she’s experienced in physical challenges. Many times they occur alongside professional successes, functioning as a wake-up call, or punch in the stomach, to make her recall not to be complacent. “Truly, I feel fate says, ‘Enjoying yourself? Sit down.’ Ever since I was a child, it has consistently accompanied achievements for me; a major or strange event has affected my well-being.”
She takes me back to her childhood, already beginning performing in the London theater in Whistle Down the Wind (she was selected at the age of nine). That’s when she was told about the cardiac issue a syndrome, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as lightheadedness and irregular beats. “I rehearsed between visits on an drip, and returning to the hospital at night.” She skips forward six years, and teenage Jess has become part of the trio Soul Deep while enrolled in the academy. “I secured a deal, and I had a stroke. Then when I was ready to debut in the year 2020 I had a collision and my throat was injured and I lost my voice for a year.”
Hey, I say, wait, I need a moment. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
