You couldn’t make it up, Jessie J says. At that moment gearing up for her new album launch in eight years, blissfully happy with her recent boyfriend, and finally the parent to a young child after dealing with conception issues for a decade, on top of the world. Then in spring she was found to have cancer in her breast.
The artist, birth name Jessica Cornish, is renowned for being brutally honest. The album, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was supposed to be an open book, addressing every moment of pain she’d experienced since she last recorded music (a gynecological condition, losing a baby, unsuccessful partnerships, gaslighting, mental health struggles) with her usual frankness. The initial release, her single No Secrets, was dropped in April. But by then there existed a huge secret. The illness. Then second single, her song Living My Best Life, came out in May and she was speaking publicly about how she was living her best life, while all the while dealing with the disease. Subsequently she shared the news, and in July she received surgical treatment.
She shoots me her best “Are you kidding?” glance. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m giving every media appearance, and they ask, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I’m, like, ‘Uh, nothing really’” she has just had to call off performances because she’s awaiting follow-up surgery.
Our interview takes place at a studio in the capital. She is dressed in a beige fake-leather jacket, jeans with elaborate white patches, beige footwear and oversized specs. Think rocker vibe meets 70s singer aesthetic. “It seems like I’m in the seventies and I should have a man with facial hair.” Like the film, I say, referencing the picture. “They used to call me that!” She smiles. She is sharp-witted, irreverent and blunt. She says she has always wanted to try comedy and is hoping to make her first comedy performance soon. “I enjoy humor. When performing I basically roast the crowd.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
Cornish was getting ready for an performance at the ceremony when she found a lump. “I immediately went to get it checked, had an scan, and they were, like, ‘It looks like nothing; your tissue is healthy.’ And I insisted, ‘Yet I sense it. I’ve got an achy arm and tingling in my hands whenever I rise.’ And they replied, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ That was 28 March, the post-birthday.” It was a Friday. The physician told her if it was serious she’d call on the Monday. By then the singer had convinced herself it was okay. The way she describes it, it was inopportune to face illness when she had so much on.
“Just two weeks before from releasing the album after eight years without an album and four years without a single. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I was, like, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I join the call expecting it’s all going to be good, and she informs me, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ The solemn tone? And she says, ‘I regret to inform you but your test results have come back as high-grade cancer cells.’” What was your reaction? “I answered, ‘Well, that’s not great. What awful timing.’ 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 lead you. You know when you have emergency surgery you roll down in a bed, but now I just strolled down with a medical attire and my backside out. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, Cornish says, she’s been lucky. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the op. “Cancer is awful, but yet Thank fuck I found it early. I had the mastectomy a few months back and my right breast now appears as a fruit under fabric.” Another grin. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”
The next operation is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her chest, she remarks, are now “uneven. The implant is larger than before. So inconsiderate! I felt, no need to bully me, I’m already having a difficult experience. Such disrespect! Amusingly I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be flawless. Illness changed that.”
Previous Struggles
The singer is no stranger to illness. She feels her attitude toward illness has been so positive because she’s used to physical challenges. Many times they occur alongside peak moments, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or blow, to highlight not to take anything for granted. “Honestly, I feel fate says, ‘Things going well? Sit down.’ Since childhood, it has often paired with achievements for me; a serious or unusual issue has impacted my body.”
She reminisces to her 11-year-old self, already beginning starring in the stage in Whistle Down the Wind (she was chosen at the age of nine). That’s when she was diagnosed with the heart condition a syndrome, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as vertigo and palpitations. “I rehearsed between visits on an IV drip, and being readmitted at night.” She jumps ahead several years, and teenage Jess has become part of the girl group the group while attending the performing arts school. “I just got my first record deal, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was planning to release songs in 2020 I had a automobile accident and my voice box shifted and I couldn’t sing for a long period.”
Hey, I say, slow down, I can’t keep up. At just 17? She nods|agrees
