You wouldn’t believe it, the singer says. At that moment readying for her first album release in nearly a decade, ecstatically in love with her current love, and finally the parent to a young child after dealing with conception issues for a decade, riding high. Then in March she was told she had cancer in her breast.
The artist, real name J. Cornish, is known for telling it as it is. The record, the provocatively titled album, was meant as an candid account, tackling every moment of pain she’d endured since she last recorded music (endometriosis, pregnancy loss, unsuccessful partnerships, emotional abuse, suicide) with typical candour. The lead track, No Secrets, was launched in the spring. But by then there was a mighty secret. The illness. Later second single, her song Living My Best Life, debuted in late spring and Cornish was giving interviews about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while still secretly living with the disease. A month later she went public, and in early July she underwent breast removal surgery.
She offers me her best “Are you kidding?” glance. “I come out with a song called No Secrets. I’m giving every interview, and they ask, ‘What’s happening?’ and I’m, like, ‘Uh, nothing really’” she has just had to postpone shows because she’s still waiting for reconstructive surgery.
We’re at a photo studio in London. She is sporting a beige fake-leather jacket, jeans with elaborate white patches, off-white boots and oversized specs. Think biker chic meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “It seems like I’m in the seventies and I should have a man with facial hair.” Easy Rider, I say, referencing the film. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She smiles. Cornish is fast-thinking, irreverent and filter-free. She says she has always been interested in humor and is aiming for her initial standup show next year. “I like entertaining. On stage I frequently joke about the fans.”
Personal Battles and News
The artist was planning an slot at the awards show when she discovered a mass. “I promptly visited to get it examined, had an test, and they were, like, ‘It appears fine; your breasts are normal.’ And I responded, ‘Yet I sense it. My arm hurts and tingling in my hands whenever I rise.’ And they suggested, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ That was 28 March, the post-birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The specialist told her if it was bad news she’d call on the Monday. By then she had assured herself it was okay. The way she tells it, it was inopportune to get cancer when she had so much on.
“It was a fortnight prior from debuting the project after eight years without an album and four years without a single. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I was, like, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I join the call believing it’s all going to be good, and she informs me, ‘Please take a seat.’ That sympathetic voice? And she reveals, ‘I regret to inform you but your test results have indicated aggressive cancer.’” What was your reaction? “I said, ‘Well, that’s not great. That’s not fucking great 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 terrifying and absurd. “I dislike anesthesia. They walk you down. In urgent cases you go on a gurney, but then I just strolled down with a hospital gown and my backside out. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, Cornish says, she’s been lucky. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the op. “Cancer is awful, but yet Thank fuck I found it early. I underwent removal a few months back and my affected breast now resembles a odd shape.” Another grin. “The nipple was preserved.”
The subsequent surgery is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her chest, she observes, are now “different sizes. The size doesn’t match. That’s impolite! I thought, no need to bully me, I’m already having a difficult experience. So rude! Amusingly I said I’d never get my boobs done because I’ve got perfectionism, and I know they’d never be ideal. Illness changed that.”
Previous Struggles
The singer is no stranger to illness. She thinks her outlook on her diagnosis has been so positive because she’s familiar with medical emergencies. Many times they occur alongside career highs, acting as a reminder, or punch in the stomach, to highlight not to be complacent. “Truly, I feel life goes, ‘Things going well? Take a seat.’ Ever since I was a child, it has often paired with achievements for me; something severe or obscure has happened to my health.”
She recalls to her childhood, already making her debut starring in the stage in Whistle Down the Wind (she was chosen at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was found to have the heart condition a syndrome, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as dizziness and irregular beats. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an intravenous line, and returning to the hospital at night.” She skips forward six years, and young Jessica has become part of the trio Soul Deep while enrolled in the performing arts school. “I just got my first record deal, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was about to put out music in the year 2020 I had a car crash and my larynx moved up and I was unable to vocalize for a long period.”
Hey, I say, hold on, I need a moment. At just 17? She nods|agrees
