You couldn’t make it up, the singer says. There she was preparing for her comeback record in eight years, ecstatically in love with her current love, and at long last the mother of a toddler after dealing with conception issues for a decade, riding high. Then in March she was found to have breast cancer.
The musician, birth name J. Cornish, is renowned for being brutally honest. The record, the provocatively titled album, was intended as an candid account, dealing with every moment of pain she’d faced since she last worked on songs (endometriosis, miscarriage, failed relationships, psychological manipulation, suicide) with typical candour. The lead track, her single No Secrets, was dropped in the spring. But by then there existed a huge secret. The illness. Later follow-up track, the upbeat Living My Best Life, debuted in late spring and she was giving interviews about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while still secretly dealing with her cancer. A month later she went public, and in early July she received surgical treatment.
She offers me her best “Are you kidding?” expression. “I put out with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m doing every media appearance, and they ask, ‘Any updates?’ and I answer, ‘Well, not much…’” she has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s yet to undergo reconstructive surgery.
Our interview takes place at a photo studio in the capital. She is dressed in a light brown synthetic jacket, jeans with ornate white designs, off-white boots and large glasses. Think biker chic meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “As if I’m in the 1970s and I should have a man with facial hair.” Like the film, I say, recalling the picture. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She grins. Jessie is sharp-witted, unfiltered and blunt. She says she has always been interested in humor and is hoping to make her first comedy performance next year. “I like entertaining. During performances I often tease the fans.”
Personal Battles and News
The artist was getting ready for an slot at the awards show when she found a lump. “I promptly visited to get it looked at, had an ultrasound, and they told me, ‘It seems benign; your breasts are normal.’ And I responded, ‘However, it’s there. My arm hurts and numbness in my fingers whenever I get up.’ And they suggested, ‘We should biopsy it?’ That was 28 March, the post-birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The specialist told her if it was serious she’d contact on the Monday. By then she had persuaded herself it was nothing. The way she tells it, it was simply too inconvenient to face illness when she had so much on.
“We’re two weeks away from debuting the project after a long hiatus and no new music. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I thought, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I join the call thinking it’s all going to be good, and she goes, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ That sympathetic voice? And she says, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your test results have shown malignant cells.’” How did you respond? “I replied, ‘Well, that’s not great. The timing is terrible.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs 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 fear going under. You’re escorted. In urgent cases you roll down in a bed, but this time I just strolled down with a hospital gown and my bum hanging out. It felt surreal.” But, she notes, she’s been lucky. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the op. “Cancer sucks, man, but yet I’m grateful it was caught soon. I had the mastectomy a few months back and my right breast now resembles a fruit under fabric.” A further beam. “The nipple was preserved.”
The next operation is for health and appearance. Her breasts, she remarks, are now “different sizes. The implant is larger than before. How rude! I reflected, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a hard period. So rude! Amusingly I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be perfect. Cancer ruined that plan.”
Previous Struggles
She is no stranger to illness. She feels her attitude toward illness has been so upbeat because she’s used to medical emergencies. Frequently they align with peak moments, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or shock, to remind her not to take anything for granted. “Honestly, I feel life goes, ‘You having a good time? Sit down.’ Since childhood, it has always gone alongside achievements for me; a major or strange event has happened to my health.”
She takes me back to her 11-year-old self, already starting her career featuring in the stage in a musical (she was cast at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was told about the heart condition Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as dizziness and heart flutters. “I rehearsed between visits on an drip, and returning to the hospital at night.” She fast-forwards half a dozen years, and teenage Jess has become part of the female band Soul Deep while enrolled in the academy. “I secured a deal, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was planning to release songs in 2020 I had a collision and my larynx moved up and I was unable to vocalize for a year.”
Oi, I say, hold on, I am overwhelmed. At just 17? She nods|agrees
