You can’t imagine it, the singer says. At that moment readying for her first album release in nearly a decade, ecstatically in love with her newish partner, and finally the mother of a toddler after struggling to conceive for a decade, feeling invincible. Suddenly in spring she was told she had breast cancer.
The musician, real name J. Cornish, is renowned for telling it as it is. The record, the provocatively titled album, was intended as an transparent story, dealing with every moment of pain she’d faced since she last made an album (endometriosis, miscarriage, failed relationships, psychological manipulation, suicide) with typical candour. The initial release, the song No Secrets, was dropped in April. But by then there was a mighty secret. Her diagnosis. Later second single, the upbeat Living My Best Life, was released in May and the artist was talking to press about how she was thriving, while all the while dealing with the disease. A month later she shared the news, and in early July she underwent breast removal surgery.
She offers me her best “Seriously?” look. “I release with a song called No Secrets. I’m conducting every interview, and they inquire, ‘Any updates?’ and I respond, ‘Uh, nothing really’” she has just had to postpone shows because she’s yet to undergo reconstructive surgery.
We’re at a photo studio in London. She is dressed in a tan faux-leather coat, blue jeans with ornate white designs, off-white boots and large glasses. Picture biker chic meets 70s singer aesthetic. “As if I’m in the 1970s and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Easy Rider, I say, recalling the picture. “That’s what people called me at school!” She smiles. She is fast-thinking, bold and filter-free. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is hoping to make her initial standup show in the coming year. “I enjoy humor. During performances I often tease the audience.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
She was getting ready for an appearance at the Baftas when she found a lump. “I immediately went to get it looked at, had an test, and they told me, ‘It appears fine; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I was, like, ‘Yet I sense it. I’ve got an achy arm and tingling in my hands whenever I wake up.’ And they said, ‘We should biopsy it?’ The date was March 28, the post-birthday.” It was a Friday. The physician told her if it was serious she’d call on the start of the week. By then the singer had convinced herself it was nothing. The way she describes it, it was inopportune to receive a diagnosis when she had so much on.
“Just two weeks before from launching this thing after eight years without an album and no new music. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I thought, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I log in believing it’s all going to be fine, and she informs me, ‘You might want to sit.’ That sympathetic voice? And she continues, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your reports have indicated high-grade cancer cells.’” What was your reaction? “I replied, ‘That’s unfortunate. That’s not fucking great timing.’ My initial thought was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”
Men have called me difficult because I’m a strong person who understands who I am
She found the surgery terrifying and absurd. “I fear going under. They walk you down. In urgent cases you roll down in a bed, but this time I just marched with a medical attire and my backside out. It felt surreal.” But, she notes, she’s been fortunate. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the op. “Cancer is awful, but you know what? Thank fuck I found it early. The surgery happened four months ago and my right breast now appears as a odd shape.” A further beam. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”
The next operation is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her boobs, she observes, are now “uneven. 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 rough time. So rude! Amusingly I said I’d never get my boobs done because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be ideal. Illness changed that.”
Past Medical Issues
She is familiar with health problems. She believes her outlook on her diagnosis has been so optimistic because she’s familiar with medical emergencies. Many times they occur alongside career highs, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or shock, to highlight not to assume everything is fine. “Honestly, I feel life goes, ‘You having a good time? Sit down.’ From a young age, it has often paired with moments of success for me; a serious or unusual issue has affected my well-being.”
She reminisces to her youth, already beginning starring in the West End in a musical (she was cast at the age of 9). That’s when she was found to have the medical problem WPW, which can cause a tachycardia as well as lightheadedness and heart flutters. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an IV drip, and returning to the hospital at night.” She jumps ahead half a dozen years, and teenage Jess has become part of the trio Soul Deep while enrolled in 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 car crash and my throat was injured and I lost my voice for a long period.”
Wow, I say, hold on, I can’t keep up. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
