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You couldn’t make it up, the singer remarks. There she was preparing for her new album launch in eight years, deeply enamored with her current love, and finally the mom to a little one after dealing with conception issues for a decade, feeling invincible. Suddenly in spring she was told she had breast cancer.

The singer-songwriter, actual name Jess Cornish, is known for being brutally honest. The LP, her latest release, was supposed to be an open book, tackling every bit of hardship she’d faced since she last recorded music (endometrial issues, miscarriage, failed relationships, gaslighting, mental health struggles) with characteristic openness. The first single, her single No Secrets, was released in April. But by then there existed a huge secret. Her diagnosis. Then next release, Living My Best Life, came out in late spring and Cornish was talking to press about how she was living her best life, while at the same time coping with breast cancer. Four weeks after she disclosed her condition, and in the start of summer she received surgical treatment.

She gives me her best “What the fuck?” look. “I come out with a song called No Secrets. I’m giving every press talk, and they ask, ‘Any updates?’ and I respond, ‘Well, not much…’” she has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s still waiting for reconstructive surgery.

Our interview takes place at a photo studio in the capital. She is dressed in a beige fake-leather jacket, blue jeans with detailed white appliqués, cream boots and oversized specs. Picture biker chic meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “It seems like I’m in the seventies and I should have a boyfriend with a big tache.” A biker reference, I say, thinking of the film. “That’s what people called me at school!” She beams. Cornish is fast-thinking, irreverent and filter-free. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is hoping to make her standup debut soon. “I love making people laugh. When performing I frequently joke about the audience.”

Personal Battles and News

The artist was preparing for an slot at the awards show when she found a lump. “I promptly visited to get it examined, had an scan, and they said, ‘It looks like nothing; your breasts are normal.’ And I responded, ‘But I can feel it. I’ve got an achy arm and numbness in my fingers whenever I get up.’ And they suggested, ‘How about a biopsy?’ The date was March 28, the following my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The physician told her if it was bad news she’d call on the start of the week. By then she had assured herself it was fine. The way she describes it, it was just bad timing to get cancer 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, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I was, like, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I log in believing it’s all going to be positive, and she says, ‘You might want to sit.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she continues, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your reports have indicated aggressive cancer.’” What did you say? “I said, ‘Well, that’s not great. That’s not fucking great timing.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘My child depends on me.’”

Men have called me difficult because I’m a strong person who understands who I am

She considered the operation frightening and surreal. “I dislike anesthesia. They walk you down. During crises you are wheeled, but this time I just walked with a gown on and my backside out. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, Cornish says, she’s been fortunate. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the op. “Cancer is awful, but you know what? Luckily it was detected early. I underwent removal a few months back and my one side now resembles a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” A further beam. “At least the nipple remains.”

The next operation is both medical and cosmetic. Her chest, she remarks, are now “asymmetrical. The size doesn’t match. That’s impolite! I reflected, no need to bully me, I’m already having a rough time. So rude! Amusingly I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be perfect. My plans were disrupted.”

Past Medical Issues

The singer is familiar with health problems. She believes her attitude toward illness has been so upbeat because she’s familiar with physical challenges. Frequently they align with professional successes, acting as a reminder, or shock, to remind her not to take anything for granted. “Honestly, I feel life goes, ‘Enjoying yourself? Take a seat.’ Ever since I was a child, it has always gone alongside moments of success for me; a major or strange event has happened to my health.”

She takes me back to her childhood, already beginning performing in the West End in a musical (she was selected at the age of 9). That’s when she was diagnosed with the cardiac issue a syndrome, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as dizziness and palpitations. “I rehearsed between visits on an intravenous line, and returning to the hospital at night.” She jumps ahead half a dozen years, and young Jessica has entered the trio Soul Deep while enrolled in the Brit School. “I secured a deal, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was about to put out music in recently I had a collision and my voice box shifted and I couldn’t sing for a long period.”

Oi, I say, hold on, I need a moment. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees