There is a kind of refusal that permeates Kokoroko’s forthcoming album Tuff Times Never Last; not in the defiant, firebrand sense of the word, but in something subtler, slower, more cultural. It is the refusal to accept genre as gospel. The refusal to render emotion through essentialist binaries. The refusal to reproduce Black British musical identity within the languorous parameters of Diasporic retelling without reimagining. If their 2022 debut Could We Be More was a document of arrival, this new chapter gestures toward dispersal: stylistically, emotionally, even spiritually.
Based on the singles released to date, the buoyant Sweetie, the more sensuous Closer To Me, and the perspicaciously frenetic Three Piece Suit (feat Azekel) — Tuff Times Never Last (due 11th July) sounds like a soft revolt against the mechanics of studio perfectionism. Just Can’t Wait released today leans into that impulse. “We’re less precious now,” Onome tells me. “There’s a lightness to it.”
Through this conversation, we trace how Kokoroko alchemise generational memory, the desire to remain wide-eyed in a world that insists on hardening us, and why the album sleeve resembles a VHS dream of Crooklyn by way of South West 9.
It’s an absolute pleasure to talk with you both today! I have loved Kokoroko for years. Abusey Junction has been a permanent fixture on my playlists since I first heard it at Uni back in 2019; it’s always mesmerised me. How are you both doing, and how has working on the new album been treating you?
Sheila: We’re doing well, thanks. We literally finished the album quite recently. We were really hands-on, and I think this is probably the most fun we’ve ever had writing together. It’s actually been the quickest mixing process we’ve ever had: we wrapped it up in a week. It’s been a great process; intense but exhilarating.
Do you think, because you’ve now done this a few times, the process felt easier? I mean, you’ve all got a bit more experience with mixing and finishing an album.
Onome: Yeah, definitely. It’s a lot more fluid now. We’re less cagey or protective over our own ideas. Everyone just throws thoughts in, and if it sounds good, even if it’s for a laugh, we encourage each other to try it. Before, something had to feel fully formed and perfect before we’d share it. Now, even if an idea isn’t fully realised, we still give it time. At the outset, there was still some hesitation, questions of is this idea good enough?, but that’s vanished. We’re more professional with each other, yet entirely freer and more open.
That sense of freedom is palpable. Let’s talk about the album title: Tuff Times Never Last. Quoted from one of the finest memes in recent memory, the four word aphorism to me gestures toward a recognition of struggle’s impermanence; an acknowledgment of hardship in the present moment, even as you look ahead. How does the dialectical tension between transience and persistence manifest in your compositional process? You’ve expanded from jazz towards British R&B, neo-soul, West African disco; how did those influences shape the album’s sense of time and impermanence?
Onome: I think the process is rooted in that very idea: knowing that tough times never last. That notion was murky in our heads at first, does this mean something?, but once it governs your life, it’s everywhere in the creative process. When we were writing, we’d give ideas time, even if we didn’t love them at first. Some evenings we’d spend hours on a song we weren’t sure would ever make the album. It was frustrating at times, because you think, are we wasting time? Yet out of that tension came some of our most essential tracks. It’s reflected in real life; moments that aren’t so fun, where you think, this sucks, and then later there’s something good on the other side. Sometimes not. Some things just don’t work out. But, having that mantra brought light to every session. The title actually came after we’d written much of the record. Once we saw it in hindsight, we thought, yes, that sums it up.
The album artwork was painted by Luci Pina. The image for me evokes a feeling of nostalgia; an urban pastoralism referencing a joyous London congregation. There's an interesting parallel throughout your album artworks between sonic excavations of diasporic musical traditions and visual invocations of Black coming-of-age narratives. Following this framework, the cityscape backgrounding Pina’s artwork pays homage to Spike Lee’s 1994 film Crooklyn and Rick Famuyiwa’s The Wood. Could you elaborate on how these films informed not just the album's visual language but perhaps its thematic concerns as well?
Sheila: Once the music started taking shape, we talked a lot about how the album felt — how we wanted listeners to feel. We knew we wanted the record to be a light during these dark times. So naturally, we began thinking about childhood memories: films we watched that gave us a sense of innocence and possibility. Onome told me how Crooklyn was a favourite film for him growing up; how it’s emotional but also incredibly uplifting. Love & Basketball personally gives that same teenage nostalgia for formative moments. Rewatching them as adults reminds you of that bright, unguarded way you once felt while learning and navigating the world.
I think it's much rarer to attain that real sense of just wonderment and a fascination with the world as you age. I feel as you get older and traverse some of the hardships of adulthood, you become more jaded, losing that sense of unbridled joy you had when you were young.
Onome: I think some of that is definitely being jaded, for sure. But think about when you were a teenager; falling in love for the first time, getting your heart broken for the first time, and then watching a film like Love & Basketball or something where someone else is going through it too. You’re like, wait, this happened to someone else? Not just me? You feel seen for the first time. Now I watch it and just think, yeah, that’s life. But back then? It opened up my whole chest, man.
We’ve got a saying with my guys: “my nose was wide open”, it means your heart’s just cracked all the way open. That feeling, of being wide-eyed and raw, that’s something we try to re-create in our music. Not even consciously, really, it’s just there in the way we eat together, hang out, record casually. It’s like trying to tap into the same spirit as when you were a kid making new friends, when every emotion felt brand new and every day stretched out like it would last forever.
We’ve got a saying with my guys: “my nose was wide open”, it means your heart’s just cracked all the way open. That feeling, of being wide-eyed and raw, that’s something we try to re-create in our music. Not even consciously, really, it’s just there in the way we eat together, hang out, record casually. It’s like trying to tap into the same spirit as when you were a kid making new friends, when every emotion felt brand new and every day stretched out like it would last forever.
I love this idea. I remember nights as a teenager oscillating between cry-laughing and cry-DMCs, every emotion felt all-encompassing, and the music playing alongside all this acted as touchpoints to narrativise these moments and compound on their emotional depth. This upcoming LP to me has the potential to become one teenagers coming-of-age in 2025 will listen to at a profoundly emotional juncture and subsequently remember as a sonic manifestation of that moment. Is this something you both are hoping for?
Onome: I’d love that. Actually, at Cheltenham Jazz Festival a couple weeks ago, someone came backstage with a sign that read: “We gave birth to your music!”. You get messages like that from time to time and you don’t quite grasp what it means right away, that you’ve somehow become part of someone’s defining moment. That’s huge.
I remember when I just had my daughter, and we were in the hospital listening to music, Tems’ Love Me JeJe had come out the day before, and that’s what we had playing. That song will stay with me forever, just linked to that time. So if someone ends up having that kind of connection with our music, whether they’re a teenager or forty-five or whatever, if something we made ends up woven into their life like that, that’s massive. That’s not something you force. It’s just a beautiful thing, a special opportunity that can be afforded to you as an artist.
I remember when I just had my daughter, and we were in the hospital listening to music, Tems’ Love Me JeJe had come out the day before, and that’s what we had playing. That song will stay with me forever, just linked to that time. So if someone ends up having that kind of connection with our music, whether they’re a teenager or forty-five or whatever, if something we made ends up woven into their life like that, that’s massive. That’s not something you force. It’s just a beautiful thing, a special opportunity that can be afforded to you as an artist.
That’s incredible, to think that every time they hear your music, they’re being transported back to something as monumental as giving birth. Also, congratulations on becoming a father!
Now, Sheila, I found it fascinating when you said earlier how you wanted the album to be a “light” during dark times. That also feeds into your EP, Get The Message, especially the track Three Piece Suit featuring Azekel, which honoured Nigerian elders in 1960s London. That kind of intergenerational dialogue is central to your work. How does Tuff Times Never Last continue, or complicate, that conversation between past and present, between ancestral wisdom and contemporary experience?
Now, Sheila, I found it fascinating when you said earlier how you wanted the album to be a “light” during dark times. That also feeds into your EP, Get The Message, especially the track Three Piece Suit featuring Azekel, which honoured Nigerian elders in 1960s London. That kind of intergenerational dialogue is central to your work. How does Tuff Times Never Last continue, or complicate, that conversation between past and present, between ancestral wisdom and contemporary experience?
Sheila: It’s always been a running theme for us. The band actually started from a conversation about what was happening in life and in Afrobeat at the time. We wanted to break the gap between generations, those who came before us and those coming after. As much as our first album illustrates our deep love for Afrobeat and highlife, we’re not going to play like our elders did. We’re based here in London; most of us were born here. We make a conscious decision to set ourselves free from the burden of trying to reproduce a traditional sound.
With Get The Message, Three Piece Suit was the first time we really melded our present with honouring what came before. Now, with Tuff Times Never Last, we’re doing that again, only deeper. We still draw from African musical heritage, but we also fold in British R&B, neo-soul, West African disco, bossa nova, funk. We want to show that diasporic memory is alive in the present moment. We’re not afraid to wear those layers: our parents’ first generation stories, our grandparents’ struggles, our own London childhoods, all in one piece of music.
Onome: Exactly. The other day I went to Balham to check out the house my grandfather bought when he moved from Nigeria. Just seeing that old flat, this was 1960s London, and he came with this idea of being a lawyer but ended up in a completely different situation. My mum grew up in a nice way but also had a lot of hardship. I talk to her now and say look at how well everyone’s doing! While she knows this to be the case, she’ll still respond with self-effacing statements like “Did I really do right by you? I didn’t give you all the things I wanted...” It was painful seeing her confidence so low. So, for us, Tuff Times Never Last is also about celebrating that lineage. Our parents and grandparents bet on themselves; some friends’ grandparents wouldn’t have had the same experience if they’d come here or to America. We’re living out their dreams, and that’s something to reflect in our music. It’s the joy and the struggle intertwined.
With Get The Message, Three Piece Suit was the first time we really melded our present with honouring what came before. Now, with Tuff Times Never Last, we’re doing that again, only deeper. We still draw from African musical heritage, but we also fold in British R&B, neo-soul, West African disco, bossa nova, funk. We want to show that diasporic memory is alive in the present moment. We’re not afraid to wear those layers: our parents’ first generation stories, our grandparents’ struggles, our own London childhoods, all in one piece of music.
Onome: Exactly. The other day I went to Balham to check out the house my grandfather bought when he moved from Nigeria. Just seeing that old flat, this was 1960s London, and he came with this idea of being a lawyer but ended up in a completely different situation. My mum grew up in a nice way but also had a lot of hardship. I talk to her now and say look at how well everyone’s doing! While she knows this to be the case, she’ll still respond with self-effacing statements like “Did I really do right by you? I didn’t give you all the things I wanted...” It was painful seeing her confidence so low. So, for us, Tuff Times Never Last is also about celebrating that lineage. Our parents and grandparents bet on themselves; some friends’ grandparents wouldn’t have had the same experience if they’d come here or to America. We’re living out their dreams, and that’s something to reflect in our music. It’s the joy and the struggle intertwined.
I hear that. My own family story is Caribbean: a mix of first and second generation. All my parents' struggles were endured to give me and my sister a chance to pursue paths we chose, creative or otherwise. That sense of generational struggle and freedom bleeds into all of this.
I want to ask about the band’s name itself, Kokoroko, which in Urhobo means “be strong” or “hard to break.” To me, that name speaks of both resilience and vulnerability. How do you balance those seemingly contradictory registers in your compositions, in continuum with addressing innately interpersonal concepts of togetherness, community, sensuality, childhood, loss, and perseverance in the upcoming album.
I want to ask about the band’s name itself, Kokoroko, which in Urhobo means “be strong” or “hard to break.” To me, that name speaks of both resilience and vulnerability. How do you balance those seemingly contradictory registers in your compositions, in continuum with addressing innately interpersonal concepts of togetherness, community, sensuality, childhood, loss, and perseverance in the upcoming album.
Onome: Honestly, strength is vulnerability. The stronger you are, the more vulnerable you can be. That softness is powerful. In the studio, the good days are when we’re gentle, open, soft with each other. The days when we’re too headstrong or protective, things fall apart. I’ve learned, as a man, that if I really want to be strong in my home, I have to be gentle and open. In music, the strongest moments are when we’re soft, vulnerable, open, and free. It’s not a weakness; it’s a different kind of strength.
That’s been so evident, especially on Could We Be More, or your live sets where you go from a forceful, horn-led crescendo into an almost fragile moment. In your music, emotion flows in a soft channel, inviting connection rather than shutting it down.
Sheila, I know you’ve played trumpet and flugelhorn — traditionally instruments with a reputation for being somewhat overpowering. How have you approached those instruments on TTNL while adhering to this theme of vulnerability and softness.
Sheila, I know you’ve played trumpet and flugelhorn — traditionally instruments with a reputation for being somewhat overpowering. How have you approached those instruments on TTNL while adhering to this theme of vulnerability and softness.
Sheila: That shift has been vital. Early on, I’d play trumpet like I was trying to fight someone. People hear trumpet and say, “It’s too brash.” But on Tuff Times Never Last, on tracks like Closer To Me or Sweetie I thought, how do I approach this horn in a softer, more delicate manner? It’s the same instrument, but a different mindset. In the show, we’ll take a track like Abusey Junction down a notch, suddenly it’s about nuance, not attack. It makes the whole thing more alive because you can contrast the power with the tenderness.
That brings us nicely onto your Sweetie single. It’s such a beautiful tune; bouncy, playful, and perspicuously Kokoroko. You’ve called it a “tantalising first taste” of where the band is heading, layering synth loops and drum machines alongside your horn signature. How do you negotiate the dialectical opposition between innovation and preservation; between keeping traditional jazz instrumentation such as the trumpet front and centre, while concurrently incorporating these electronic modalities?
Sheila: With Sweetie, we were trying to marry old and new. We’ve been listening to classic West African disco, where everything, drum loops, synth lines, is this joyful innocent thing. You hear William Onyeabor, using a range of synths and electronic sounds that were so novel and fresh at the time, and you can hear the excitement in the music.
So, when we sat down to write both Sweetie and Three Piece Suit, there was a shared playfulness and innocence. We added synthesised percussion loops and drum-machine bits, but those parts never replaced live instruments. If the synths weren’t there, we’d have filled the space with more horns, percussion, or backing vocals. We just pick whatever helps the song breathe.
I think when there’s so much we have available, we’d be stupid not to experiment. We could be purists, but where’s the joy in that? Our best creative output materialises when we’re just creating without any restraints or rules going in, tapping into the childlike innocence and boundless curiosity we’ve been talking about. As Picasso supposedly said [Onome notes here Sheila went to art school], “Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up.” If we maintain that innocence, that curiosity, the music stays alive.
So, when we sat down to write both Sweetie and Three Piece Suit, there was a shared playfulness and innocence. We added synthesised percussion loops and drum-machine bits, but those parts never replaced live instruments. If the synths weren’t there, we’d have filled the space with more horns, percussion, or backing vocals. We just pick whatever helps the song breathe.
I think when there’s so much we have available, we’d be stupid not to experiment. We could be purists, but where’s the joy in that? Our best creative output materialises when we’re just creating without any restraints or rules going in, tapping into the childlike innocence and boundless curiosity we’ve been talking about. As Picasso supposedly said [Onome notes here Sheila went to art school], “Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up.” If we maintain that innocence, that curiosity, the music stays alive.
Your other single from the album, Closer To Me, has a dynamic neosoul-esque groove to it. How did you arrive at its sonic shape? What’s the story behind that song as it took form?
When we began making Closer To Me, the drums felt entirely different, no vocals at first. As we added layers, it snapped into this bouncy pocket. Early on, the groove almost felt like a hip‐hop record. But ultimately, it became another side of the same story: a summation of records we loved when we were younger.
We grew up listening to D’Angelo's Brown Sugar, an album full of references towards Fela Kuti – you hear dedications on every record, or a sample, or some riff that references Afrobeat. We’re influenced by people who were influenced by others, and it all comes out in interesting ways. The entire album plays with that idea: there’s no fixed context anymore. You can’t pinpoint where something started; it’s this continuous journey through different sounds.
We grew up listening to D’Angelo's Brown Sugar, an album full of references towards Fela Kuti – you hear dedications on every record, or a sample, or some riff that references Afrobeat. We’re influenced by people who were influenced by others, and it all comes out in interesting ways. The entire album plays with that idea: there’s no fixed context anymore. You can’t pinpoint where something started; it’s this continuous journey through different sounds.
Back in 2019, Onome described Afrobeat as “a conversation between the audience and the performer.” Live energy fundamentally shapes how you play. How did you try to capture that audience‐performer dialogue on Tuff Times Never Last? Is that communal energy embedded in the album?
Sheila: That sense of community has been with us from day one. Before we recorded anything, we always tested new material in front of crowds, watching how people moved and reacted. The audience was always part of our writing process. We were, for a long time, known more as a live band than a strictly studio band. The congregational feel naturally informs how we write and arrange.
But this time around, we also wanted a more produced approach. We didn’t want to be limited by live versus studio. So, we allowed ourselves to sketch ideas on stage, then take them into the studio for extra production: synths, drum machines, whatever felt right. We never tied ourselves down. There’s still room for spontaneous energy, but with space for detail you wouldn’t always catch in a club.
Onome: Yeah, Sheila’s covered it. That live‐testing phase remains central; it simply coexists now with a studio mindset.
But this time around, we also wanted a more produced approach. We didn’t want to be limited by live versus studio. So, we allowed ourselves to sketch ideas on stage, then take them into the studio for extra production: synths, drum machines, whatever felt right. We never tied ourselves down. There’s still room for spontaneous energy, but with space for detail you wouldn’t always catch in a club.
Onome: Yeah, Sheila’s covered it. That live‐testing phase remains central; it simply coexists now with a studio mindset.
The UK jazz renaissance has produced an abundance of talents - Sons of Kemet, Ezra Collective, Kamaal Williams. How do you see Kokoroko in relation to your contemporaries? Is there a sense of dialogue, or do you operate more on parallel but separate paths?
Onome: I’d say both. We have a strong kinship because we come from the same city, often similar backgrounds, but we’re all firmly rooted in our individual experiences, different families, different neighbourhoods. Still, we’re all part of Black British music, telling variations of the same story.
There’s so much amazing Black music coming out of this country: dance, electronic, hip- hop, jazz. Our generation of jazz musicians has had the privilege of seeing each other grow up and witness each other doing incredible things. It’s inspiring and motivating. It makes you feel, okay, we can scale up and really build a career, because it’s not just a handful of us doing this. There’s a whole community telling similar stories, enjoying the same things, but each with their own voice.
There’s so much amazing Black music coming out of this country: dance, electronic, hip- hop, jazz. Our generation of jazz musicians has had the privilege of seeing each other grow up and witness each other doing incredible things. It’s inspiring and motivating. It makes you feel, okay, we can scale up and really build a career, because it’s not just a handful of us doing this. There’s a whole community telling similar stories, enjoying the same things, but each with their own voice.
Sheila, you once said how, "innately, we're jazz musicians, but we've tried not to kind of box ourselves into one sound." This resistance to confinement seems particularly significant when contextualised within the music industry's historical apparatus that has systematically pigeonholed Black artists within rigid genre classifications. How do you navigate industry pressures towards marketable categorisation whilst maintaining the fluidity that defines your artistic vision?
Sheila: It’s been a journey, without a doubt. Early on, we leaned into Afrobeat jazz as a descriptor because it was tidy compartment. But as we matured, we realised we don’t just want to play Afrobeat; we want to play everything. Some of my favourite musicians — Miles Davis, for instance — never defined what they did. Miles said, “I don’t know what jazz is; I know what I play.” That always stuck with me. Labelling is a Western concern, used to market and sell. But for us, as long as we’re free to follow inspiration, whether that takes us to funk, lovers rock, or house, we’ll go there.
Onome: If you let a genre label limit you, it throttles your creativity. Some people feel special by calling something jazz, and that’s valid, they haven’t had that experience before. But maybe they’ve heard those ideas in hip‐hop or R&B. Ultimately, it’s all connected. If someone loves you because you’re jazz, or because you’re Afrobeat, or both, fine. As long as they resonate, and we’re not forced into an identity that doesn’t match what we do.
Onome: If you let a genre label limit you, it throttles your creativity. Some people feel special by calling something jazz, and that’s valid, they haven’t had that experience before. But maybe they’ve heard those ideas in hip‐hop or R&B. Ultimately, it’s all connected. If someone loves you because you’re jazz, or because you’re Afrobeat, or both, fine. As long as they resonate, and we’re not forced into an identity that doesn’t match what we do.
Your music feels deeply connected to London’s cultural landscape. When you need a break from the studio, where do you go to recharge or find inspiration? Any hidden gems, restaurants, record shops, galleries?
Sheila: Our studio in London Fields is cosy; I love the area. Whenever we’re worn out, we step into the park or grab brownies from that little shop next door, nothing fancy, but it clears our heads.
Onome: Yeah. There’s a quiet energy in the area that gives us breathing space without overwhelming us. You need a balance: enough distractions to refresh, but not so many that you can’t focus on writing. Also, Okko and Kioku are two restaurants we have to shout out, they keep us alive!
Onome: Yeah. There’s a quiet energy in the area that gives us breathing space without overwhelming us. You need a balance: enough distractions to refresh, but not so many that you can’t focus on writing. Also, Okko and Kioku are two restaurants we have to shout out, they keep us alive!
Let’s talk about your headline show at O2 Academy Brixton on 25 September. That’s a monumental stage. How are you both feeling — nerves, excitement? Anything special planned for that night?
Sheila: We’re trying to downplay it, but it’s massive for us. So many of our heroes have played Brixton; it’s iconic. I’m terrified but also thrilled knowing that one day I’ll look back and think, wow, I can’t believe we got to this stage. It feels like a rite of passage.
Onome: I used to live near Brixton as a kid; I remember rushing to shows after school, soaking up the chaos at the station. Now to think we’re on that stage, playing our own music, is surreal. The energy around Brixton is special; every time there’s a gig, it’s electric. To be part of that is mind‐blowing. We’re grateful and excited, ready to soak up every moment.
Onome: I used to live near Brixton as a kid; I remember rushing to shows after school, soaking up the chaos at the station. Now to think we’re on that stage, playing our own music, is surreal. The energy around Brixton is special; every time there’s a gig, it’s electric. To be part of that is mind‐blowing. We’re grateful and excited, ready to soak up every moment.
Finally, looking beyond Tuff Times Never Last, where do you see Kokoroko heading? Any new soundscapes or collaborators you’re itching to explore?
Sheila: We’re already writing fresh material, and it sounds very different; still in our continuum, but funkier, stranger. We’ve always been keen to collaborate with someone like Blood Orange; hopefully we can make that happen.
Onome: I’m just excited for this album to breathe, it’s something I’m so proud of. Every time I see Luci’s artwork, it makes me smile. We’re finishing the video now, and everyone’s buzzing about sharing what we’ve created. But beyond that, there’s more to add — this is just the beginning of a musical journey, our sonic journey. I can’t wait to see where it goes next.
Onome: I’m just excited for this album to breathe, it’s something I’m so proud of. Every time I see Luci’s artwork, it makes me smile. We’re finishing the video now, and everyone’s buzzing about sharing what we’ve created. But beyond that, there’s more to add — this is just the beginning of a musical journey, our sonic journey. I can’t wait to see where it goes next.
