You couldn’t make it up, the singer says. There she was readying for her first album release in eight years, blissfully happy with her current love, and finally the parent to a young child after struggling to conceive for a decade, on top of the world. Then in spring she was told she had breast cancer.
The singer-songwriter, actual name Jess Cornish, is known for speaking her mind. The LP, the provocatively titled album, was intended as an transparent story, addressing every moment of pain she’d faced since she last worked on songs (endometrial issues, pregnancy loss, failed relationships, gaslighting, suicidal thoughts) with typical candour. The first single, her single No Secrets, was dropped in April. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The cancer. Later next release, Living My Best Life, debuted in late spring and she was speaking publicly about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while still secretly dealing with the disease. Subsequently she disclosed her condition, and in July she received surgical treatment.
She gives me her best “Seriously?” glance. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m conducting every interview, and they ask, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I answer, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” the singer has just had to postpone shows because she’s yet to undergo follow-up surgery.
We’re at a studio in the capital. She is wearing a light brown synthetic jacket, jeans with detailed white appliqués, beige footwear and big frames. Imagine rocker vibe meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “I feel like I’m in the seventies and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Easy Rider, I say, recalling the film. “That’s what people called me at school!” She smiles. Cornish is fast-thinking, irreverent and direct. She says she has always been interested in humor and is hoping to make her standup debut in the coming year. “I love making people laugh. On stage I basically roast the fans.”
Personal Battles and News
Cornish was getting ready for an performance at the awards show when she discovered a mass. “I quickly sought to get it checked, had an scan, and they said, ‘It looks like nothing; your tissue is healthy.’ And I responded, ‘However, it’s there. My arm hurts and pins and needles in my hands whenever I wake up.’ And they replied, ‘How about a biopsy?’ That was 28 March, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The physician told her if it was bad news she’d contact on the Monday. By then Cornish had assured herself it was fine. The way she tells it, it was just bad timing to face illness 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 [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 believing it’s all going to be good, and she goes, ‘Please take a seat.’ That sympathetic voice? And she continues, ‘I regret to inform you but your reports have come back as aggressive cancer.’” What did you say? “I answered, ‘Well, that’s not great. That’s not fucking great timing.’ My initial 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 hate being put under. They lead you. You know when you have emergency surgery you are wheeled, but then I just walked with a gown on and my backside out. It felt surreal.” But, she notes, she’s been fortunate. Without chemo or radio, just the surgery. “Cancer sucks, man, but you know what? I’m grateful it was caught soon. I had the mastectomy a few months back and my one side now appears as a odd shape.” She smiles again. “At least the nipple remains.”
The next operation is for health and appearance. Her breasts, she notes, are now “uneven. The implant is larger than before. That’s impolite! I thought, 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 perfectionism, and I know they’d never be perfect. Illness changed that.”
Previous Struggles
Cornish is accustomed to medical issues. She feels her perspective on the cancer has been so positive because she’s familiar with medical emergencies. Frequently they align with peak moments, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or blow, to make her recall not to take anything for granted. “Frankly, I feel fate says, ‘Things going well? Hold on.’ Since childhood, it has always gone alongside achievements for me; a major or strange event has affected my well-being.”
She recalls to her 11-year-old self, already making her debut featuring in the London theater in the production (she was selected at the age of nine). That’s when she was told about the medical problem WPW, which can cause a tachycardia as well as lightheadedness and heart flutters. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an drip, and returning to the hospital at night.” She skips forward half a dozen years, and teenage Jess has become part of the girl group Soul Deep while studying at the Brit School. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was ready to debut in the year 2020 I had a automobile accident and my larynx moved up and I couldn’t sing for a year.”
Hey, I say, slow down, I need a moment. At just 17? She nods|agrees
