You couldn’t make it up, the singer says. There she was preparing for her new album launch in nearly a decade, blissfully happy with her recent boyfriend, and at long last the mom to a little one after dealing with conception issues for a decade, on top of the world. Then in March she was found to have breast cancer.
The singer-songwriter, birth name J. Cornish, is famous for being brutally honest. The album, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was meant as an open book, tackling every moment of pain she’d endured since she last worked on songs (endometriosis, losing a baby, failed relationships, gaslighting, mental health struggles) with typical candour. The first single, her single No Secrets, was released in April. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The cancer. Later second single, her song Living My Best Life, was released in May and she was giving interviews about how she was living her best life, while still secretly coping with her cancer. Four weeks after she disclosed her condition, and in early July she received surgical treatment.
She offers me her best “Seriously?” expression. “I come out with a song called No Secrets. I’m doing every press talk, and they ask, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I respond, ‘Uh, nothing really’” she has just had to postpone shows because she’s yet to undergo reconstructive surgery.
We meet at a photography studio in London. She is wearing a beige fake-leather jacket, blue jeans with detailed white appliqués, beige footwear and oversized specs. Imagine rocker vibe meets 70s singer aesthetic. “It seems like I’m in the 1970s and I should have a boyfriend with a big tache.” A biker reference, I say, thinking of the film. “They used to call me that!” She grins. Jessie is quick, irreverent and blunt. She says she has always wanted to try comedy and is planning to attempt her first comedy performance next year. “I enjoy humor. When performing I often tease the fans.”
Personal Battles and News
Cornish was preparing for an performance at the ceremony when she found a lump. “I immediately went to get it looked at, had an scan, and they told me, ‘It appears fine; your breasts are normal.’ And I was, like, ‘Yet I sense it. My arm hurts and pins and needles in my hands whenever I wake up.’ And they replied, ‘We should biopsy it?’ The date was March 28, the following my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The doctor told her if it was serious she’d call on the start of the week. By then she had persuaded herself it was fine. The way she describes it, it was simply too inconvenient to get cancer when she had a busy schedule.
“Just two weeks before from debuting the project after eight years without an album and no new music. And she contacted me and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I was, like, ‘It’s virtual, probably routine.’ So I log in expecting it’s all going to be positive, and she informs me, ‘Please take a seat.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she reveals, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your biopsy results have come back as aggressive cancer.’” What was your reaction? “I replied, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. What awful timing.’ My initial thought was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”
Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness
She considered the operation terrifying and absurd. “I fear going under. They lead you. You know when you have emergency surgery you go on a gurney, but now I just strolled down with a gown on and my rear exposed. It felt surreal.” But, she notes, she’s been blessed. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the procedure. “Cancer sucks, man, but however Thank fuck I found it early. I had the mastectomy a few months back and my affected breast now resembles a fruit under fabric.” A further beam. “At least the nipple remains.”
The follow-up procedure is both medical and cosmetic. Her breasts, she notes, are now “different sizes. The implant is larger than before. How rude! I reflected, why make it worse, I’m already having a hard period. Such disrespect! Amusingly I said I’d never get my boobs done because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be perfect. My plans were disrupted.”
Previous Struggles
Cornish is accustomed to medical issues. She believes her perspective on the cancer has been so upbeat because she’s used to medical emergencies. Many times they occur alongside peak moments, acting as a reminder, or blow, to remind her not to assume everything is fine. “Truly, I feel life goes, ‘You having a good time? Sit down.’ From a young age, it has always gone alongside achievements for me; a serious or unusual issue has impacted my body.”
She reminisces to her youth, already starting her career starring in the London theater in the production (she was chosen at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was diagnosed with the heart condition Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a tachycardia as well as lightheadedness and palpitations. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an intravenous line, 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 attending the performing arts school. “I just got my first record deal, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was planning to release songs in 2020 I had a collision and my voice box shifted and I lost my voice for a long period.”
Oi, I say, wait, I can’t keep up. At just 17? She nods|agrees
