You can’t imagine it, the singer remarks. At that moment gearing up for her new album launch in nearly a decade, ecstatically in love with her recent boyfriend, and finally the mother of a toddler after facing fertility challenges for a decade, on top of the world. Then in March she was told she had a breast cancer diagnosis.
The musician, birth name Jessica Cornish, is famous for being brutally honest. The LP, her latest release, was meant as an open book, dealing with every moment of pain she’d experienced since she last made an album (a gynecological condition, losing a baby, unsuccessful partnerships, gaslighting, suicidal thoughts) with her usual frankness. The initial release, No Secrets, was launched in April. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. Her diagnosis. Later second single, Living My Best Life, was released in May and she was giving interviews about how she was thriving, while still secretly coping with the disease. Four weeks after she shared the news, and in the start of summer she received surgical treatment.
She offers me her best “What the fuck?” glance. “I come out with a song called No Secrets. I’m doing every media appearance, and they inquire, ‘What’s happening?’ and I respond, ‘Well, not much…’” Cornish has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s awaiting follow-up surgery.
We’re at a photography studio in the capital. She is dressed in a beige fake-leather jacket, jeans with elaborate white patches, off-white boots and big frames. Imagine rocker vibe meets 70s singer aesthetic. “It seems like I’m in the seventies and I should have a man with facial hair.” A biker reference, I say, thinking of the movie. “That’s what people called me at school!” She smiles. She is fast-thinking, unfiltered and direct. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is hoping to make her first comedy performance next year. “I love making people laugh. During performances I frequently joke about the crowd.”
Personal Battles and News
She was getting ready for an appearance at the awards show when she found a lump. “I quickly sought to get it examined, had an test, and they were, like, ‘It appears fine; your tissue is healthy.’ And I was, like, ‘Yet I sense it. I have arm pain and pins and needles in my hands whenever I rise.’ And they replied, ‘How about a biopsy?’ That was 28 March, the post-birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The specialist told her if it was bad news she’d reach out on the Monday. By then the singer had persuaded herself it was okay. The way she describes it, it was just bad timing to receive a diagnosis when she had so much on.
“Just two weeks before from launching this thing after eight years without an album and four years without a single. And she contacted me and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I was, like, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I join the call thinking it’s all going to be positive, and she informs me, ‘You might want to sit.’ The solemn tone? And she reveals, ‘I regret to inform you but your biopsy results have indicated high-grade cancer cells.’” What was your reaction? “I said, ‘That’s unfortunate. What awful timing.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”
Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness
She viewed the procedure terrifying and absurd. “I fear going under. They lead you. During crises you are wheeled, but then I just walked with a medical attire and my backside out. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, she notes, she’s been lucky. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the surgery. “Cancer is awful, but however Luckily it was detected early. I had the mastectomy four months ago and my right breast now looks like a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” Another grin. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”
The follow-up procedure is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her breasts, she remarks, are now “asymmetrical. The size doesn’t match. How rude! I reflected, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a rough time. Such disrespect! Ironically 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 thinks her perspective on the cancer has been so positive because she’s experienced in health crises. They have often coincided with professional successes, acting as a reminder, or blow, to highlight not to assume everything is fine. “Truly, I feel life goes, ‘Things going well? Sit down.’ Since childhood, it has consistently accompanied moments of success for me; something severe or obscure has affected my well-being.”
She takes me back to her childhood, already starting her career performing in the London theater in the production (she was chosen at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was told about the heart condition Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as dizziness and palpitations. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an intravenous line, and being readmitted at night.” She skips forward half a dozen years, and 17-year-old Jess has joined the female band Soul Deep while studying at the performing arts school. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a stroke. Then when I was planning to release songs in recently I had a automobile accident and my voice box shifted and I was unable to vocalize for a long period.”
Wow, I say, hold on, I can’t keep up. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
