You couldn’t make it up, Jessie J remarks. There she was readying for her new album launch in nearly a decade, ecstatically in love with her newish partner, and finally the parent to a young child after struggling to conceive for a decade, on top of the world. Then in March she was found to have cancer in her breast.
The musician, birth name Jess Cornish, is known for speaking her mind. The LP, her latest release, was intended as an transparent story, dealing with every bit of hardship she’d faced since she last worked on songs (endometriosis, miscarriage, failed relationships, emotional abuse, suicidal thoughts) with characteristic openness. The first single, the song No Secrets, was dropped in the spring. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The cancer. Then follow-up track, Living My Best Life, was released in late spring and Cornish was giving interviews about how she was living her best life, while all the while living with the disease. A month later she shared the news, and in the start of summer she had a mastectomy.
She offers me her best “What the fuck?” expression. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m doing every press talk, and they ask, ‘Any updates?’ and I’m, like, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” she has just had to call off performances because she’s awaiting follow-up surgery.
We’re at a photography studio in the capital. She is dressed in a light brown synthetic jacket, jeans with elaborate white patches, off-white boots and big frames. Picture biker chic meets vintage look. “I feel like I’m in the 70s and I should have a man with facial hair.” Easy Rider, I say, referencing the film. “They used to call me that!” She beams. Cornish is fast-thinking, irreverent and filter-free. She says she has always been interested in humor and is hoping to make her initial standup show next year. “I love making people laugh. On stage I frequently joke about the crowd.”
Personal Battles and News
She was getting ready for an appearance at the awards show when she discovered a mass. “I promptly visited to get it examined, had an ultrasound, and they were, like, ‘It seems benign; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I was, like, ‘But I can feel it. My arm hurts and numbness in my fingers whenever I wake up.’ And they suggested, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ It happened on March 28, the day after my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The specialist told her if it was serious she’d call on the start of the week. By then the singer had assured herself it was okay. The way she tells it, it was inopportune to get cancer when she had so much on.
“Just two weeks before from releasing the album after a long hiatus and no new music. And she contacted me and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I was, like, ‘It’s virtual, probably routine.’ So I log in believing it’s all going to be positive, and she goes, ‘Please take a seat.’ That sympathetic voice? And she says, ‘I regret to inform you but your reports have shown aggressive cancer.’” How did you respond? “I replied, ‘That’s unfortunate. That’s not fucking great timing.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”
Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness
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 now I just marched with a gown on and my bum hanging out. It felt surreal.” But, she adds, she’s been blessed. Without chemo or radio, just the surgery. “It’s terrible, but you know what? Thank fuck I found it early. The surgery happened a few months back and my one side now appears as a fruit under fabric.” Another grin. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”
The next operation is both medical and cosmetic. Her chest, 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 rough time. So rude! Amusingly I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be ideal. My plans were disrupted.”
A History of Health Challenges
Cornish is no stranger to illness. She feels her perspective on the cancer has been so upbeat because she’s familiar with health crises. They have often coincided with career highs, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or shock, to make her recall not to take anything for granted. “Truly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘Things going well? Take a seat.’ Since childhood, it has consistently accompanied high points for me; a serious or unusual issue has impacted my body.”
She reminisces to her youth, already making her debut performing in the stage in a musical (she was cast at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was told about the medical problem a syndrome, which can cause a fast heartbeat 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 skips forward half a dozen years, and young Jessica has become part of the girl group the group while studying at 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 2020 I had a collision and my throat was injured and I was unable to vocalize for a year.”
Oi, I say, slow down, I am overwhelmed. At just 17? She nods|agrees
