Jermaine Cole, aka J. Cole, was born in Germany on January 28, 1985, and raised in Fayetteville, North Carolina.
He rose to prominence as a rapper after publishing his debut mixtape, The Come Up, in early 2007.
J. Cole parents: Meet Kay Cole
According to research we have conducted into the above subject matter the rapper’s mother was the only one who raised him and his brother after their father abandoned them.
She is of European American descent and she worked at United States Postal Service to support the family.
Cole began rapping when he was 12 years old and chose to make it his full-time career when he got older.
He began producing under the alias Therapist and eventually cooperated with the local band Bomm Sheltuh as a rapper and producer.
Cole had many notebooks full of song ideas at the age of 14 but was unable to produce rhythms beyond sampling. He and his cousin worked on refining their basic understanding of rhyming and wordplay after being musically inspired by rap legends such as Canibus, Nas, Tupac, and Eminem.
Source: Ghanafuo.com
