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You wouldn’t believe it, the singer remarks. At that moment readying for her new album launch in eight years, deeply enamored with her recent boyfriend, and finally the parent to a young child after struggling to conceive for a decade, on top of the world. Then in spring she was told she had cancer in her breast.

The musician, actual name Jessica Cornish, is known for telling it as it is. The LP, the provocatively titled album, was intended as an open book, dealing with every moment of pain she’d endured since she last made an album (endometriosis, losing a baby, unsuccessful partnerships, psychological manipulation, suicide) with her usual frankness. The first single, No Secrets, was dropped in the spring. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The illness. Later follow-up track, her song Living My Best Life, came out in late spring and Cornish was giving interviews about how she was living her best life, while still secretly living with her cancer. Four weeks after she disclosed her condition, and in the start of summer she received surgical treatment.

She shoots me her best “What the fuck?” look. “I release with a song called No Secrets. I’m giving every press talk, and they’re, like, ‘Any updates?’ and I respond, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” the singer has just had to call off performances because she’s awaiting cosmetic procedures.

We meet at a photo studio in London. She is dressed in a beige fake-leather jacket, jeans with ornate white designs, cream boots and big frames. Picture biker chic meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “I feel like I’m in the 70s and I should have a man with facial hair.” Easy Rider, I say, referencing the movie. “That’s what people called me at school!” She smiles. Jessie is sharp-witted, irreverent and blunt. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is hoping to make her initial standup show soon. “I love making people laugh. When performing I frequently joke about the fans.”

Health Struggles and Diagnosis

The artist was getting ready for an appearance at the Baftas when she discovered a mass. “I promptly visited to get it looked at, had an test, and they were, like, ‘It seems benign; your breasts are normal.’ And I was, like, ‘But I can feel it. My arm hurts and numbness in my fingers whenever I rise.’ And they replied, ‘How about a biopsy?’ It happened on March 28, the post-birthday.” It was a Friday. The specialist told her if it was concerning she’d contact on the Monday. By then the singer had persuaded 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 releasing the album after years away and an extended break. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I assumed, ‘It’s virtual, probably routine.’ So I join the call believing it’s all going to be good, and she goes, ‘You might want to sit.’ That sympathetic voice? And she says, ‘Unfortunately but your biopsy results have come back as malignant cells.’” How did you respond? “I said, ‘That’s unfortunate. That’s not fucking great timing.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”

I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself

She found the surgery terrifying and absurd. “I dislike anesthesia. You’re escorted. You know when you have emergency surgery you are wheeled, but then I just strolled down with a medical attire and my backside out. Like a dystopian scene.” But, she adds, she’s been blessed. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the surgery. “It’s terrible, but yet Thank fuck I found it early. I had the mastectomy a few months back and my one side now looks like a fruit under fabric.” She smiles again. “At least the nipple remains.”

The follow-up procedure is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her boobs, she observes, are now “different sizes. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. That’s impolite! I reflected, no need to bully me, I’m already having a difficult experience. Such disrespect! Amusingly I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be flawless. Cancer ruined that plan.”

Previous Struggles

She is familiar with health problems. She thinks her perspective on the cancer has been so positive because she’s familiar with medical emergencies. Frequently they align with professional successes, acting as a reminder, or blow, to remind her not to assume everything is fine. “Honestly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘Enjoying yourself? Take a seat.’ Since childhood, it has often paired with high points for me; a major or strange event has impacted my body.”

She takes me back to her youth, already making her debut featuring in the stage in a musical (she was chosen at the age of 9). That’s when she was told about the medical problem Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as vertigo and palpitations. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an drip, and returning to the hospital at night.” She jumps ahead several years, and 17-year-old Jess has become part of the female band the group while enrolled in the academy. “I secured a deal, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was ready to debut in the year 2020 I had a car crash and my voice box shifted and I was unable to vocalize for a long period.”

Wow, I say, hold on, I am overwhelmed. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees