You couldn’t make it up, Jessie J remarks. At that moment readying for her first album release in eight years, ecstatically in love with her recent boyfriend, and finally the mom to a little one after dealing with conception issues for a decade, on top of the world. Suddenly in spring she was found to have breast cancer.
The artist, real name J. Cornish, is known for being brutally honest. The LP, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was intended as an transparent story, tackling every ounce of devastation she’d faced since she last recorded music (endometriosis, pregnancy loss, broken romances, gaslighting, suicide) with her usual frankness. The initial release, her single No Secrets, was released in the spring. But by then there existed a huge secret. The illness. Later next release, Living My Best Life, came out in late spring and she was speaking publicly about how she was living her best life, while at the same time dealing with the disease. A month later she shared the news, and in July she underwent breast removal surgery.
She shoots me her best “What the fuck?” glance. “I put out with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m doing every press talk, and they inquire, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I answer, ‘Uh, nothing really’” the singer has just had to call off performances because she’s yet to undergo follow-up surgery.
We meet at a photography studio in the capital. She is wearing a light brown synthetic jacket, jeans with detailed white appliqués, cream boots and large glasses. Picture motorcycle style meets 70s singer aesthetic. “I feel like I’m in the 1970s and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Like the film, I say, thinking of the picture. “They used to call me that!” She grins. Cornish is sharp-witted, irreverent and direct. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is aiming for her first comedy performance next year. “I love making people laugh. On stage I frequently joke about the fans.”
Health Struggles and Diagnosis
She was getting ready for an performance at the awards show when she found a lump. “I quickly sought to get it looked at, had an test, and they said, ‘It seems benign; your breasts are normal.’ And I was, like, ‘Yet I sense it. My arm hurts and pins and needles in my hands whenever I rise.’ And they replied, ‘How about a biopsy?’ That was 28 March, the day after my birthday.” It was a Friday. The physician told her if it was bad news she’d call on the Monday. By then she had assured herself it was nothing. The way she tells it, it was simply too inconvenient to face illness when she had many commitments.
“We’re two weeks away from launching this thing after eight years without an album and no new music. And she contacted me and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I assumed, ‘It’s virtual, probably routine.’ So I join the call thinking it’s all going to be positive, and she says, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ That sympathetic voice? And she reveals, ‘Unfortunately but your test results have come back as high-grade cancer cells.’” What was your reaction? “I said, ‘Well, that’s not great. That’s not fucking great timing.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘My child depends on me.’”
Men have called me difficult because I’m a strong person who understands who I am
She viewed the procedure terrifying and absurd. “I dislike anesthesia. They lead you. During crises you roll down in a bed, but this time I just strolled down with a gown on and my rear exposed. Like a dystopian scene.” But, Cornish says, she’s been fortunate. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the op. “Cancer is awful, but you know what? Thank fuck I found it early. I had the mastectomy four months ago and my right breast now appears as a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” Another grin. “At least the nipple remains.”
The follow-up procedure is both medical and cosmetic. Her boobs, she notes, are now “uneven. The implant is larger than before. How rude! I felt, why make it worse, I’m already having a difficult experience. How offensive! Amusingly I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be flawless. Illness changed that.”
A History of Health Challenges
The singer is familiar with health problems. She thinks her outlook on her diagnosis has been so upbeat because she’s experienced in health crises. Frequently they align with professional successes, acting as a reminder, or blow, to remind her not to take anything for granted. “Frankly, I feel fate says, ‘Things going well? Take a seat.’ Ever since I was a child, it has always gone alongside achievements for me; something severe or obscure has impacted my body.”
She takes me back to her 11-year-old self, already starting her career featuring in the West End in Whistle Down the Wind (she was selected at the age of nine). That’s when she was found to have the cardiac issue Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a tachycardia as well as lightheadedness and palpitations. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an IV drip, and returning to the hospital at night.” She jumps ahead half a dozen years, and 17-year-old Jess has become part of the trio Soul Deep while attending the Brit School. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was planning to release songs in the year 2020 I had a collision and my throat was injured and I lost my voice for a twelve months.”
Hey, I say, wait, I am overwhelmed. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
