You wouldn’t believe it, the singer remarks. There she was readying for her comeback record in eight years, deeply enamored with her newish partner, and finally the mom to a little one after struggling to conceive for ten years, feeling invincible. Suddenly in March she was diagnosed with breast cancer.
The musician, actual name J. Cornish, is known for being brutally honest. The record, her latest release, was meant as an candid account, tackling every ounce of devastation she’d experienced since she last worked on songs (endometrial issues, miscarriage, unsuccessful partnerships, psychological manipulation, suicide) with typical candour. The first single, her single No Secrets, was dropped in the spring. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The illness. Then second single, the upbeat Living My Best Life, debuted in May and the artist was talking to press about how she was thriving, while at the same time dealing with breast cancer. Subsequently she disclosed her condition, and in July she had a mastectomy.
She shoots me her best “What the fuck?” look. “I come out with a song called No Secrets. I’m doing every interview, and they inquire, ‘What’s happening?’ and I respond, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” Cornish has just had to call off performances because she’s awaiting follow-up surgery.
We meet at a studio in the capital. She is dressed in a tan faux-leather coat, jeans with elaborate white patches, beige footwear and oversized specs. Picture rocker vibe meets vintage look. “It seems like I’m in the 1970s and I should have a boyfriend with a big tache.” Like the film, I say, thinking of the picture. “That’s what people called me at school!” She beams. Cornish is fast-thinking, unfiltered and direct. She says she has always wanted to try comedy and is planning to attempt her standup debut soon. “I love making people laugh. On stage I basically roast the audience.”
Personal Battles and News
She was preparing for an performance at the Baftas when she found a lump. “I promptly visited to get it checked, had an ultrasound, and they told me, ‘It seems benign; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I insisted, ‘However, it’s there. My arm hurts and tingling in my hands whenever I wake up.’ And they replied, ‘How about a biopsy?’ It happened on March 28, the day after my birthday.” It was a Friday. The specialist told her if it was serious she’d reach out on the start of the week. By then the singer had assured herself it was fine. The way she tells it, it was just bad timing to face illness when she had so much on.
“Just two weeks before from launching this thing after years away and no new music. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I was, like, ‘It’s virtual, probably routine.’ So I log in thinking it’s all going to be positive, and she informs me, ‘You might want to sit.’ The solemn tone? And she says, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your reports have shown malignant cells.’” How did you respond? “I said, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. That’s not fucking great timing.’ Immediately I felt 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 frightening and surreal. “I dislike anesthesia. They walk you down. In urgent cases you go on a gurney, but then I just marched with a gown on and my rear exposed. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, Cornish says, she’s been fortunate. Without chemo or radio, just the procedure. “It’s terrible, but you know what? Luckily it was detected early. I underwent removal four months ago and my affected breast now looks like a odd shape.” A further beam. “The nipple was preserved.”
The follow-up procedure is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her chest, she remarks, are now “different sizes. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. So inconsiderate! 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 OCD, and I know they’d never be ideal. My plans were disrupted.”
Previous Struggles
The singer is familiar with health problems. She thinks her perspective on the cancer has been so optimistic because she’s used to physical challenges. Frequently they align with professional successes, functioning as a wake-up call, or blow, to remind her not to be complacent. “Truly, I feel fate says, ‘Things going well? Sit down.’ Ever since I was a child, it has always gone alongside moments of success for me; a major or strange event has impacted my body.”
She takes me back to her 11-year-old self, already starting her career starring in the London theater in a musical (she was chosen at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was told about the heart condition WPW, which can cause a tachycardia as well as vertigo and palpitations. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an drip, and going back into hospital at night.” She fast-forwards several years, and teenage Jess has entered the girl group the group while enrolled in the Brit School. “I just got my first record deal, 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 lost my voice for a year.”
Hey, I say, slow down, I need a moment. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
