You can’t imagine it, Jessie J says. There she was preparing for her first album release in nearly a decade, blissfully happy with her current love, and finally the parent to a young child after facing fertility challenges for ten years, feeling invincible. Suddenly in March she was diagnosed with cancer in her breast.
The musician, real name Jess Cornish, is known for telling it as it is. The LP, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was intended as an transparent story, dealing with every ounce of devastation she’d faced since she last recorded music (endometriosis, pregnancy loss, failed relationships, gaslighting, suicide) with typical candour. The first single, No Secrets, was released in April. But by then there was a mighty secret. The illness. Then second single, Living My Best Life, was released in late spring and the artist was talking to press about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while still secretly dealing with the disease. A month later she went public, and in July she received surgical treatment.
She gives me her best “Seriously?” expression. “I come out with a song called No Secrets. I’m doing every press talk, and they ask, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I respond, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” 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 detailed white appliqués, off-white boots and large glasses. Picture biker chic meets vintage look. “I feel like I’m in the 70s and I should have a boyfriend with a big tache.” A biker reference, I say, recalling the movie. “They used to call me that!” She smiles. Cornish is sharp-witted, bold and filter-free. She says she has always been interested in humor and is planning to attempt her initial standup show in the coming year. “I like entertaining. When performing I frequently joke about the fans.”
Personal Battles and News
Cornish was planning an performance at the ceremony when she noticed an abnormality. “I quickly sought to get it checked, had an ultrasound, and they said, ‘It seems benign; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I insisted, ‘However, it’s there. I have arm pain and tingling in my hands whenever I get up.’ And they suggested, ‘We should biopsy it?’ That was 28 March, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The doctor told her if it was bad news she’d reach out on the Monday. By then the singer had persuaded herself it was fine. The way she explains it, it was inopportune to get cancer when she had a busy schedule.
“It was a fortnight prior from launching this thing after years away and an extended break. And she contacted me and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I assumed, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I join the call expecting it’s all going to be fine, and she informs me, ‘You might want to sit.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she continues, ‘I regret to inform you but your test results have indicated high-grade cancer cells.’” How did you respond? “I said, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. The timing is terrible.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She viewed the procedure frightening and surreal. “I hate being put under. They walk you down. In urgent cases you roll down in a bed, but now I just marched with a hospital gown and my bum hanging out. It felt surreal.” But, she notes, she’s been lucky. Without chemo or radio, just the procedure. “Cancer is awful, but yet Thank fuck I found it early. I underwent removal four months ago and my affected breast now resembles a odd shape.” A further beam. “The nipple was preserved.”
The follow-up procedure is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her breasts, she remarks, are now “asymmetrical. The size doesn’t match. How rude! 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 obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be ideal. My plans were disrupted.”
Past Medical Issues
Cornish is familiar with health problems. She believes her perspective on the cancer has been so positive because she’s familiar with physical challenges. Frequently they align with career highs, functioning as a wake-up call, or blow, to remind her not to take anything for granted. “Frankly, I feel fate says, ‘You having a good time? Sit down.’ Since childhood, it has always gone alongside moments of success for me; a serious or unusual issue has happened to my health.”
She recalls to her childhood, already beginning starring in the stage in the production (she was selected at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was diagnosed with the heart condition WPW, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as lightheadedness and irregular beats. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an drip, and returning to the hospital at night.” She jumps ahead half a dozen years, and 17-year-old Jess has joined the girl group Soul Deep while attending the performing arts school. “I just got my first record deal, and I had a stroke. Then when I was planning to release songs in 2020 I had a collision and my voice box shifted and I was unable to vocalize for a twelve months.”
Hey, I say, wait, I am overwhelmed. At just 17? She nods|agrees
