You can’t imagine it, the singer states. There she was gearing up for her comeback record in nearly a decade, deeply enamored with her current love, and finally the mom to a little one after struggling to conceive for a decade, on top of the world. Suddenly in spring she was found to have breast cancer.
The singer-songwriter, real name Jess Cornish, is renowned for telling it as it is. The record, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was supposed to be an candid account, addressing every moment of pain she’d faced since she last made an album (endometriosis, losing a baby, failed relationships, psychological manipulation, suicide) with characteristic openness. The first single, No Secrets, was launched in April. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. Her diagnosis. Then follow-up track, Living My Best Life, came out in May and Cornish was talking to press about how she was living her best life, while at the same time dealing with the disease. Subsequently she shared the news, and in the start of summer she received surgical treatment.
She offers me her best “What the fuck?” expression. “I come out with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m giving every media appearance, and they’re, like, ‘What’s happening?’ and I answer, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” Cornish has just had to call off performances because she’s yet to undergo follow-up surgery.
We’re at a studio in London. She is dressed in a light brown synthetic jacket, jeans with detailed white appliqués, cream boots and big frames. Picture motorcycle style 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, recalling the film. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She grins. Cornish is fast-thinking, unfiltered and direct. She says she has always been interested in humor and is hoping to make her first comedy performance next year. “I enjoy humor. During performances I frequently joke about the fans.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
She was getting ready for an appearance at the awards show when she discovered a mass. “I promptly visited to get it checked, had an test, and they were, like, ‘It appears fine; your breasts are normal.’ And I insisted, ‘Yet I sense it. My arm hurts and pins and needles in my hands whenever I rise.’ And they suggested, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ It happened on 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 Cornish had persuaded herself it was fine. The way she explains it, it was simply too inconvenient to get cancer when she had so much on.
“Just two weeks before from releasing the album after years away and an extended break. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I was, like, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I jump on the Zoom expecting it’s all going to be good, and she goes, ‘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?. The timing is terrible.’ My initial thought was, ‘My child depends on me.’”
Men have called me difficult because I’m a strong person who understands who I am
She viewed the procedure scary and bizarre. “I dislike anesthesia. You’re escorted. You know when you have emergency surgery you are wheeled, but now I just strolled down with a medical attire and my rear exposed. Like a dystopian scene.” But, Cornish says, she’s been blessed. Without chemo or radio, just the procedure. “Cancer sucks, man, but yet Thank fuck I found it early. I had the mastectomy four months ago and my affected breast now resembles a odd shape.” A further beam. “At least the nipple remains.”
The next operation is for health and appearance. Her breasts, she notes, are now “asymmetrical. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. How rude! I reflected, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a difficult experience. Such disrespect! Amusingly I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be flawless. My plans were disrupted.”
A History of Health Challenges
The singer is accustomed to medical issues. She believes her attitude toward illness has been so positive because she’s familiar with physical challenges. They have often coincided with career highs, acting as a reminder, or shock, to remind her not to assume everything is fine. “Truly, I feel fate says, ‘Things going well? Hold on.’ From a young age, it has often paired with moments of success for me; a major or strange event has impacted my body.”
She recalls to her childhood, already starting her career performing in the stage in a musical (she was chosen at the age of 9). That’s when she was found to have the heart condition a syndrome, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as vertigo and palpitations. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an drip, and going back into hospital at night.” She fast-forwards several years, and 17-year-old Jess has entered the female band Soul Deep while enrolled in the academy. “I secured a deal, and I had a stroke. Then when I was about to put out music in the year 2020 I had a car crash and my throat was injured and I lost my voice for a twelve months.”
Oi, I say, slow down, I can’t keep up. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
