You wouldn’t believe it, Jessie J remarks. At that moment preparing for her new album launch in eight years, blissfully happy with her newish partner, and finally the parent to a young child after facing fertility challenges for a decade, riding high. Suddenly in March she was diagnosed with cancer in her breast.
The musician, actual name J. Cornish, is renowned for telling it as it is. The record, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was intended as an transparent story, dealing with every bit of hardship she’d faced since she last made an album (endometriosis, pregnancy loss, broken romances, emotional abuse, suicidal thoughts) with typical candour. The lead track, No Secrets, was dropped in the spring. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The cancer. Later second single, Living My Best Life, came out in late spring and the artist was talking to press about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while all the while living with the disease. Subsequently she disclosed her condition, and in early July she had a mastectomy.
She offers me her best “Are you kidding?” expression. “I release with a song called No Secrets. I’m conducting every press talk, and they ask, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I respond, ‘Uh, nothing really’” she has just had to call off performances because she’s yet to undergo cosmetic procedures.
We’re at a studio in London. She is dressed in a tan faux-leather coat, jeans with detailed white appliqués, off-white boots and large glasses. Imagine rocker vibe meets 70s singer aesthetic. “I feel like I’m in the 1970s and I should have a partner with a mustache.” A biker reference, I say, recalling the movie. “That’s what people called me at school!” She grins. Cornish is quick, bold and filter-free. She says she has always been interested in humor and is planning to attempt her first comedy performance next year. “I love making people laugh. During performances I often tease the audience.”
Personal Battles and News
The artist was getting ready for an performance at the Baftas when she noticed an abnormality. “I quickly sought to get it looked at, had an test, and they told me, ‘It seems benign; your breasts are normal.’ And I responded, ‘Yet I sense 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 day after my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The physician told her if it was serious she’d call on the Monday. By then the singer had persuaded herself it was nothing. The way she explains it, it was just bad timing to receive a diagnosis when she had many commitments.
“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, ‘Is six okay?’ And I assumed, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I log in expecting it’s all going to be fine, and she says, ‘Please take a seat.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she continues, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your test results have come back as high-grade cancer cells.’” How did you respond? “I said, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. 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 viewed the procedure terrifying and absurd. “I dislike anesthesia. They walk you down. During crises you roll down in a bed, but then I just strolled down with a gown on and my rear exposed. Like a dystopian scene.” But, Cornish says, she’s been blessed. Without chemo or radio, just the op. “It’s terrible, but you know what? I’m grateful it was caught soon. I underwent removal a few months back and my right breast now looks like a odd shape.” Another grin. “The nipple was preserved.”
The next operation is both medical and cosmetic. Her boobs, she observes, are now “different sizes. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. So inconsiderate! I felt, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a rough time. Such disrespect! Ironically I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be perfect. Illness changed that.”
Previous Struggles
The singer is no stranger to illness. She believes her outlook on her diagnosis has been so positive because she’s familiar with medical emergencies. Frequently they align with peak moments, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or shock, to highlight not to assume everything is fine. “Truly, I feel fate says, ‘Things going well? Hold on.’ Since childhood, it has always gone alongside achievements for me; something severe or obscure has happened to my health.”
She takes me back to her youth, already making her debut performing in the West End in the production (she was selected at the age of nine). That’s when she was found to have the medical problem Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as lightheadedness and irregular beats. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an intravenous line, and returning to the hospital at night.” She jumps ahead six years, and young Jessica has entered the female band Soul Deep while studying at the academy. “I secured a deal, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was about to put out music in the year 2020 I had a car crash and my larynx moved up and I lost my voice for a twelve months.”
Wow, I say, hold on, I need a moment. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
