You can’t imagine it, the singer states. 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 facing fertility challenges for ten years, riding high. Suddenly in March she was told she had breast cancer.
The musician, real name Jessica Cornish, is renowned for speaking her mind. The album, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was meant as an transparent story, tackling every ounce of devastation she’d experienced since she last worked on songs (endometrial issues, miscarriage, unsuccessful partnerships, gaslighting, suicidal thoughts) with characteristic openness. The lead track, No Secrets, was dropped in April. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. Her diagnosis. Later second single, Living My Best Life, debuted in late spring and she was giving interviews about how she was thriving, while still secretly dealing with the disease. Subsequently she went public, and in July she had a mastectomy.
She offers me her best “Are you kidding?” look. “I release with a song called No Secrets. I’m giving every press talk, and they ask, ‘Any updates?’ and I answer, ‘Well, not much…’” the singer has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s awaiting cosmetic procedures.
Our interview takes place at a photo studio in the capital. She is sporting a beige fake-leather jacket, blue jeans with ornate white designs, cream boots and oversized specs. Think biker chic meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “As if I’m in the 70s and I should have a boyfriend with a big tache.” A biker reference, I say, thinking of the picture. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She beams. Jessie is sharp-witted, unfiltered and blunt. She says she has always wanted to try comedy and is hoping to make her initial standup show soon. “I like entertaining. On stage I basically roast the fans.”
Personal Battles and News
She was preparing for an slot at the awards show when she discovered a mass. “I immediately went to get it checked, had an test, and they said, ‘It seems benign; your tissue is healthy.’ And I insisted, ‘But I can feel it. I’ve got an achy arm and numbness in my fingers whenever I wake up.’ And they said, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ The date was March 28, the day after my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The physician told her if it was bad news she’d contact on the start of the week. By then she had assured herself it was fine. The way she tells it, it was simply too inconvenient to receive a diagnosis when she had a busy schedule.
“It was a fortnight prior from debuting the project after years away and four years without a single. And she contacted me and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I assumed, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I jump on the Zoom expecting it’s all going to be fine, and she goes, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ That sympathetic voice? And she continues, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your biopsy results have come back as high-grade cancer cells.’” What was your reaction? “I replied, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. What awful timing.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”
Men have called me difficult because I’m a strong person who understands who I am
She viewed the procedure scary and bizarre. “I hate being put under. You’re escorted. During crises you roll down in a bed, but this time I just strolled down with a gown on and my rear exposed. Like a dystopian scene.” But, Cornish says, she’s been blessed. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the op. “It’s terrible, but however Thank fuck I found it early. The surgery happened a few months back and my one side now resembles a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” She smiles again. “At least the nipple remains.”
The subsequent surgery is for health and appearance. Her breasts, she notes, are now “asymmetrical. The implant is larger than before. So inconsiderate! I reflected, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a hard period. How offensive! Amusingly I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got perfectionism, and I know they’d never be perfect. Cancer ruined that plan.”
Past Medical Issues
She is familiar with health problems. She feels her attitude toward illness has been so positive because she’s experienced in health crises. They have often coincided with professional successes, acting as a reminder, or shock, to make her recall not to assume everything is fine. “Truly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘Things going well? Hold on.’ From a young age, it has always gone alongside achievements for me; something severe or obscure has affected my well-being.”
She takes me back to her 11-year-old self, already beginning performing in the West End in Whistle Down the Wind (she was selected at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was found to have the cardiac issue WPW, which can cause a tachycardia as well as dizziness and irregular beats. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an intravenous line, and going back into hospital at night.” She jumps ahead several years, and teenage Jess has become part of the trio the group while studying at the performing arts school. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a stroke. Then when I was about to put out music in recently I had a automobile accident and my voice box shifted and I was unable to vocalize for a long period.”
Hey, I say, slow down, I am overwhelmed. At just 17? She nods|agrees
