When thinking of her childhood, one particular phrase from it is burned into Coco Jones’ brain forever: “What’s the deal, pickle? Is everything kosher?”
“That meant get your a** up. It’s time for school,” she tells me with a laugh, remembering every detail down to the nostalgic intro from the local radio host. Every morning, the intercoms throughout her Lebanon, Tennessee, home would blast 101.1 The Beat, as her three younger siblings’ footsteps ignited all around the house. The buttery smell of grits, biscuits, eggs, and bacon wafted through the walls as her dad—former NFL player Mike Jones—cooked breakfast while her mom—session vocalist Javonda Jones—did the girls’ hair.
Knowing her roots, the North Carolina-born artist’s easy and authentic Southern charm makes complete sense. From the moment she walks into the photo studio, Coco is equal parts poised, confident, and down-to-earth. Jones has the kind of glow that only comes from being comfortable in one’s own skin. Considering her many years as a Disney Channel kid and a talented basketball player, neither her intensity nor her dedication to excellence should be a surprise. Her mom, the reason why she never gave up on herself, is still her plus-one to every big Hollywood event to this day.
Fast forward to spring 2025, and things are definitely still kosher. The 27-year-old’s career has materialized into an unending stream of scenes straight from her vision board. In 2024, before Jones’ first album was even released, she’d garnered seven Grammy nominations and won “Best R&B Performance” for “ICU.” And even that was after she was crowned “Best New Artist” at the BET Awards in 2023. Since then, the woman that Beyoncé declared could “sing her a** off” scored invites to the Met Gala, Oscars, and Roc Nation Brunch.
With all those cylinders firing, the only thing left should have been the release of her first official album—but that turned out to be a winding road that nearly broke her down. Her debut album, Why Not More?, finally made landfall on April 25. What was supposed to be a cathartic and joyful day also doubled as an intense metamorphosis. Fans flooded her Instagram to congratulate her, only to be met with Coco, via a vlog-style behind-the-scenes reel, emotionally discussing her hopes and the process of creating the album.
“I just hope it means something… I feel like I’m kind of grieving a little bit,” she says, her voice softly cracking with emotion. “People ask me if I’m excited about it, f**k no. This sh*t hurt me. It brings out the worst side of you, ‘cause it’s supposed to, and you gotta write about ‘em.”
What was the pain behind the tears? It was a deep desire not to disappoint herself, because a debut album is forever. Coco wanted to get it exactly right. The love and care she has for her music was all-consuming, and in her words, “almost sent me on a spiral.” “I think that was the side of me I felt was the worst, this ‘no grace’ part. Basically, it was just pushing yourself until you’re satisfied with yourself. To have to put together a piece of work and present it to a label after you’ve already had certain levels of success, it’s just a very uncomfortable place to be in. It brings so many expectations from myself, from the world.”
“I’m also my worst critic,” she adds. Her logical, hardworking brain kicked in. “I feel like I have an expectation to myself that I can make things happen faster than they happen in reality, in real time. I feel like if I work hard enough and I have the right song, it would do that again.” To make things happen for herself, she knows to put her head down and work… fiercely.
After all, that’s what she’s been doing since she was 11 years old, going to auditions and sleeping in recording studios on school nights. The evening prior to this cover shoot, Coco delivered a headlining set at the Brooklyn Paramount for the New York City stop of her Why Not More? Tour to a screaming, sold-out crowd of 2,700 fans chanting her lyrics right back to her. Then, with every muscle in her body aching like a linebacker on Monday morning, she rose before dawn to do a press day before coming to see VIBE.
Now, I’m like, ‘You have fans. You don’t need to convince them.’ Meaning you can be in the moment without pitching yourself. This isn’t a sales show. They’re already sold, and that feels good.”
And in decidedly opposite R&B diva-like behavior, Jones arrives 45 minutes early, breezes through glam and styling, and completes a whole extra look. That’s when I asked if she needed a well-deserved break to decompress after the shoot, in between getting her hair re-braided and our interview. Her manager looks at me, cracks a slight smile, and says matter-of-factly, “No. Don’t worry, she prefers doing two things at the same time.”
“Two things” is an understatement when describing Coco Jones’ work ethic. In addition to the tour, she’s simultaneously filming the fourth and final season of Bel-Air, Peacock’s well-loved Fresh Prince reboot. Her life has become a vigorous balancing act as the opportunities continue to roll in at the highest rate they’ve ever been. However, she’d much rather have it this way, as she remembers the season prior to this, where people hardly seemed to be tuning in.
After high school, the Let It Shine star made the leap to move out to Los Angeles on her own to chase her dreams. Her “coming of age” era was an absolute whirlwind, with her LA adventures giving her the real-life experiences she felt she lacked at the time. The jump from “literally being homeschooled, to the Disney Channel thing, to this” was intense, but necessary.
“I feel like I had to live because I was super sheltered up until then by choice. Like, I didn’t care to go be around boys, I didn’t care to go party. I just wanted to be employed. I wanted to do more of the things that make me happy, and when I moved to LA, that’s what I wanted to do,” she says. She was able to move relatively incognito during those days, a blessing in disguise because she was able to be free to make mistakes, party, and date. Future’s “March Madness” dominated the clubs at the time and “made the floor levitate,” and she distinctly remembers being blown away by the rise of artists like Summer Walker, SZA, and Bryson Tiller.
On her own, she was being as productive as life would allow, picking up acting roles here and there, enrolling in classes at a music school, and networking horizontally with peers who were in similar stages of their careers. She affectionately refers to this period as her “unemployed days,” reminiscing about the nights watching Broad City and eating Wingstop with her fellow unemployed best friend, who she met on the set of Good Luck, Charlie as a kid. “We were literally like, what’s going on with our lives?” she says.
However, when the savings stacked up from her Disney Channel years started to dwindle, serious decisions had to be made. After being dropped from Hollywood Records a few years prior, she was determined to prove she can still make something shake with her move to LA. Her self-funded music videos and YouTube covers were getting more clicks than the average creator, but the results were nowhere close to the sparkling visions of stardom she had embedded in her brain for herself that she couldn’t let go.
One of the lowest valleys she remembers is a phone call from her mother, where even her most optimistic cheerleader was considering facing the music.
“One day my mom called me. My mom has always been the person with the positive outlook, the find a solution, the ‘what about this?’ She was always coming with different options. I would go to my mom and be like, ‘I want to give up,’ knowing she’s not going to go with that. She’s going to be like, ‘Here’s an option.’ She is the ultimate hype man.”
“But I remember she called me and she was like, ‘So we need to have a conversation because you’re running out of money… Here are some options: You could always come home. You can try to teach something in music. Maybe you could do vocal classes for people.’ And she was giving me options that I did not want to hear. They weren’t uplifting, and they were very reality-based. She wasn’t trying to bring me down or anything, but it was like, okay, your time’s up. So now what?”
Having to look in the mirror and deeply question if all those life-long sacrifices were even worth it is tough. Although those are rough words for a dreamer to hear, I point out an important saving grace—not every artist is fortunate enough to have: “You could always come home.” Hearing those words kept Coco from buckling under the pressure and resorting to doing things that didn’t align with her moral compass, which could have brought a vastly different ending to her story.
When certain auditions didn’t go as planned, the voice in her head would say over and over again, “Why not me?” When other opportunities did seem to finally look promising, a closer look at the terms and conditions would reveal stipulations that, in her heart, she knew she wasn’t comfortable with. “They would say, ‘Oh by the way, later on in the season, [my character] is gonna do this. You’re cool with that, right?” she recalls. The constant yoyo-ing of her success being dangled right in front of her became potent, but she never faltered because of the foundation her dreams were built on.
“That security kept me from folding, from doing things that I knew would take pieces of my soul. Bit by bit, I feel like it gave me another option of being able to say no,” she reflects. “Because there wasn’t more pressure than the pressure I was putting on myself. It wasn’t like I was trying to feed my family, or people were guilt-tripping me into making this happen, or the stakes of trying to provide for people. At the end of the day, I was like, ‘If it’s over, it’s over. And I’m still going to be good.’ It was me against me.”
Now that Coco made it out on the other side, she’s experienced so much—but still has so much left to see. She knows both the feeling of being a kid and starring in one of the biggest movies on Disney Channel at the time, and having a No. 1 R&B EP as an adult. She knows what it feels like to have it all stripped away. She knows the reality of colorism in the industry, the fickle nature of paid opportunities, and sitting there night after night wondering if it will all pay off one day.
Above all, she knows what it’s like to dust yourself off, pick up the pieces, and try again. She took the scenic route, and it brought humility, thicker skin, and trust that everything will be okay if you just keep going. And now, she’s ready.
Because of how it all played out, she also doesn’t let her head get too up in the clouds, even as all her wildest dreams are finally coming true. The humbling moments she’s had are the anchors that will keep her from floating too far from the shore. After a trip down memory lane together, then snapping back to the reality of her success now, I ask her how she’s honestly feeling at this very moment. “I’m sober-minded and level-headed,” she says, pensively. She takes a bite from her fruit cup and looks up at the dressing room ceiling to really think about her answer.
I’ve learned I’m not the same girl who can put myself on the back burner. If I don’t recharge, I’m out of energy. That girl was probably just scared of failure.”
“Because I’m proud of the work that I’ve done, but I know there’s a lot more to do. When someone said, ‘You have the Beyoncé work ethic.’ And I’m like, but do you really know what that means? There’s no end date to that. That’s the truth. There’s no giving up. It’s not feelings-based. It’s literally a very sober-minded state of doing what you got to do. So I’m happy with what I’ve done, and I will be happy to keep working.”
She’s also grown to a place of giving herself more grace, taking breaks, and setting boundaries. Gone are the days of being too hard on herself, worrying about failure, and seeking approval. After many years of performing on Disney Channel stages and feeling like she had to “win the crowd over,” she now basks in the realization that if people bought tickets to her show, they’re already on her side.
“I think it’s because I did a lot of performing in places where nobody knew me, so the goal was always to convince them that they enjoy this, that they want to get to know who I am. Now, I’m like, ‘You have fans. You don’t need to convince them.’ Meaning you can be in the moment without pitching yourself. This isn’t a sales show. They’re already sold, and that feels good.”
When it comes to her romantic relationship, a sizzling topic among her fans, her flag is firmly planted on the side of complete privacy, and she doesn’t feel bad about it. “I really think my brain is like, ‘No.’ I feel like it’s my version of rebellion and control. Y’all don’t get this, this is my thing. I gave y’all every freaking thing and more, and this is mine. So in a way, it’s like, ‘No, I don’t want to share. I don’t have to. That’s not part of the job.’ I feel like if everything was exploited, I would go insane because there would be nothing left.”
And finally, after working nonstop for most of her life, she’s comfortable with letting herself take a break after this tour is finished. When I remind her in previous interviews that she’s said she gets antsy when she takes breaks longer than five days, she replies, “I don’t know who that girl was.”
I smile to myself when she tells me she has a countdown to the tour’s final night, because I’m happy she’s giving herself the rest she’s always deserved. “I’ve learned I’m not the same girl who can put myself on the back burner. If I don’t recharge, I’m out of energy. That girl was probably just scared of failure. The one who would do everything, say ‘yes’ to everything, and say ‘no’ to herself. But now, the me that’s not afraid of failure can recognize that there’s a battery on this brain, on this voice, and on this happiness. And if I don’t recharge it, it’s out of energy. So I’m learning to say no more or ‘not yet.’”
At this chapter in her life, Coco has shown immense growth, and that’s all any loyal fanbase can ask for. She’s grateful for it all, grounded, and has a good head on her shoulders. She’s given her fans everything she could (for now) and will kick her feet up in a few weeks, and I’m glad she knows she’s earned it.
***
Photographer: Rashida Zagon
Photo Assistant/DigiTech: Garren Pryce
Lighting Director: Neriah McBain
Creative Director: Sage East
Prop Stylist: Chloé Lucan
Hair Stylist: Elizabeth Semande
Makeup Artist: Andrea Ventura
Wardrobe Stylist: Darryl Glover
Wardrobe Assistant: Jamila Jabulani
Videographer: Jason Chandler
Production Assistants: Damora Regala, Alyssa Jones, Bryant Diaz
Art Designer: R. Scott Wells
Photo Editor: Jordyn Katz
Market Editor: Karolina Dorau
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