You couldn’t make it up, the singer says. At that moment preparing for her new album launch in eight years, deeply enamored with her recent boyfriend, and finally the parent to a young child after facing fertility challenges for a decade, on top of the world. Suddenly in spring she was found to have a breast cancer diagnosis.
The artist, actual name Jess Cornish, is renowned for telling it as it is. The LP, her latest release, was intended as an candid account, addressing every ounce of devastation she’d faced since she last made an album (endometrial issues, losing a baby, failed relationships, psychological manipulation, suicide) with her usual frankness. The first single, the song No Secrets, was dropped in April. But by then there existed a huge secret. The illness. Then next release, Living My Best Life, came out in late spring and the artist was speaking publicly about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while at the same time living with breast cancer. Four weeks after she disclosed her condition, and in early July she received surgical treatment.
She offers me her best “Are you kidding?” glance. “I come out with a song called No Secrets. I’m giving every press talk, and they’re, like, ‘What’s happening?’ and I respond, ‘Well, not much…’” the singer has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s yet to undergo cosmetic procedures.
We meet at a photo studio in the capital. She is dressed in a light brown synthetic jacket, denim trousers with ornate white designs, off-white boots and oversized specs. Think rocker vibe meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “I feel like I’m in the 70s and I should have a boyfriend with a big tache.” A biker reference, I say, thinking of the film. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She beams. Cornish is quick, irreverent and blunt. She says she has always wanted to try comedy and is hoping to make her first comedy performance in the coming year. “I enjoy humor. When performing I frequently joke about the audience.”
Health Struggles and Diagnosis
She was preparing for an appearance at the Baftas when she discovered a mass. “I immediately went to get it checked, had an test, and they said, ‘It looks like nothing; your tissue is healthy.’ And I was, like, ‘But I can feel it. I’ve got an achy arm and tingling in my hands whenever I rise.’ And they suggested, ‘We should biopsy it?’ The date was March 28, the day after my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The physician told her if it was serious 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 just bad timing to receive a diagnosis when she had many commitments.
“Just two weeks before from launching this thing after eight years without an album and no new music. And she contacted me and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I assumed, ‘It’s virtual, probably routine.’ So I join the call believing it’s all going to be fine, and she informs me, ‘Please take a seat.’ That sympathetic voice? And she says, ‘I regret to inform you but your test results have indicated aggressive cancer.’” How did you respond? “I answered, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. What awful timing.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”
Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness
She considered the operation scary and bizarre. “I fear going under. You’re escorted. In urgent cases you roll down in a bed, but this time I just walked with a medical attire and my bum hanging out. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, Cornish says, she’s been fortunate. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the surgery. “Cancer is awful, but you know what? I’m grateful it was caught soon. The surgery happened a few months back and my right breast now appears as a fruit under fabric.” A further beam. “The nipple was preserved.”
The follow-up procedure is for health and appearance. Her boobs, she observes, are now “uneven. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. That’s impolite! I thought, why make it worse, I’m already having a hard period. So rude! Amusingly I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be ideal. Illness changed that.”
A History of Health Challenges
The singer is no stranger to illness. She feels her attitude toward illness has been so upbeat because she’s used to physical challenges. Frequently they align with career highs, acting as a reminder, or shock, to highlight not to be complacent. “Frankly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘You having a good time? Sit down.’ From a young age, it has always gone alongside moments of success for me; a serious or unusual issue has happened to my health.”
She recalls to her youth, already making her debut featuring in the London theater in a musical (she was chosen at the age of nine). That’s when she was told about the medical problem WPW, which can cause a tachycardia as well as dizziness and heart flutters. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an drip, and going back into hospital at night.” She jumps ahead several years, and teenage Jess has become part of the trio Soul Deep while attending the Brit School. “I just got my first record deal, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was planning to release songs in the year 2020 I had a automobile accident and my larynx moved up and I was unable to vocalize for a year.”
Hey, I say, wait, I can’t keep up. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
