You wouldn’t believe it, the singer says. At that moment readying for her first album release in nearly a decade, deeply enamored with her current love, and at long last the mom to a little one after dealing with conception issues for ten years, feeling invincible. Suddenly in March she was found to have cancer in her breast.
The singer-songwriter, actual name Jess Cornish, is renowned for speaking her mind. The LP, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was supposed to be an open book, tackling every moment of pain she’d experienced since she last made an album (endometrial issues, pregnancy loss, broken romances, gaslighting, mental health struggles) with her usual frankness. The first single, No Secrets, was dropped in April. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. Her diagnosis. Later next release, Living My Best Life, came out in late spring and the artist was talking to press about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while still secretly living with the disease. A month later she disclosed her condition, and in early July she received surgical treatment.
She offers me her best “Are you kidding?” expression. “I release with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m doing every interview, and they’re, like, ‘Any updates?’ and I’m, like, ‘Uh, nothing really’” she has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s awaiting follow-up surgery.
We meet at a photo studio in the capital. She is dressed in a beige fake-leather jacket, jeans with elaborate white patches, off-white boots and oversized specs. Imagine motorcycle style meets vintage look. “I feel like I’m in the seventies and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Easy Rider, I say, recalling the picture. “They used to call me that!” She beams. Cornish is sharp-witted, irreverent and blunt. She says she has always been interested in humor and is hoping to make her first comedy performance next year. “I love making people laugh. On stage I frequently joke about the fans.”
Personal Battles and News
The artist was preparing for an performance at the ceremony when she noticed an abnormality. “I promptly visited to get it checked, had an ultrasound, and they said, ‘It appears fine; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I insisted, ‘But I can feel it. My arm hurts and numbness in my fingers whenever I get up.’ And they replied, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ It happened on March 28, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The specialist told her if it was bad news she’d reach out on the start of the week. By then the singer had assured herself it was nothing. The way she tells it, it was inopportune to get cancer when she had so much on.
“It was a fortnight prior from debuting the project after years away and an extended break. And she contacted me and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I thought, ‘It’s virtual, probably routine.’ So I jump on the Zoom expecting it’s all going to be good, and she goes, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she reveals, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your biopsy results have come back as high-grade cancer cells.’” What was your reaction? “I said, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. What awful timing.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”
Men have called me difficult because I’m a strong person who understands who I am
She considered the operation scary and bizarre. “I hate being put under. They walk you down. During crises you go on a gurney, but this time I just strolled down with a hospital gown and my rear exposed. Like a dystopian scene.” But, she adds, she’s been lucky. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the op. “Cancer sucks, man, but you know what? Luckily it was detected early. I underwent removal four months ago and my one side now looks like a odd shape.” She smiles again. “At least the nipple remains.”
The follow-up procedure is for health and appearance. Her boobs, she notes, are now “different sizes. The size doesn’t match. So inconsiderate! I felt, no need to bully me, I’m already having a rough time. How offensive! Amusingly I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be perfect. My plans were disrupted.”
Past Medical Issues
She is familiar with health problems. She thinks her perspective on the cancer has been so optimistic because she’s experienced in medical emergencies. Many times they occur alongside career highs, functioning as a wake-up call, or blow, to highlight not to take anything for granted. “Truly, I feel life goes, ‘You having a good time? Hold on.’ From a young age, it has consistently accompanied high points for me; something severe or obscure has happened to my health.”
She takes me back to her youth, already beginning performing in the stage in a musical (she was cast at the age of nine). That’s when she was diagnosed with the heart condition WPW, which can cause a tachycardia as well as vertigo and palpitations. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an intravenous line, and returning to the hospital at night.” She jumps ahead several years, and young Jessica has joined the girl group the group while enrolled in the academy. “I secured a deal, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was about to put out music in the year 2020 I had a automobile accident and my voice box shifted and I couldn’t sing for a twelve months.”
Oi, I say, hold on, I am overwhelmed. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
