Sokolinski was born in Bordeaux, France to a Russian-Polish Jewish father and a French-Italian Jewish mother. She has used the nickname Soko as long as she can remember. Soko left home at 16, quit school and moved to Paris to start acting class with Eva Saint-Paul where she studied for one year; she then resumed her education at several different schools, but quickly became tired of it and dropped out. She later appeared in several French films and began to write songs.