Josh first appears on YouTube under the name “gothickingcobra52” on June 13th, 2010. He refers to himself simply as “Gothic King Cobra”, describing himself as a “sexy gothic musician who enjoys playing electric guitar and singing” who “[hopes] to be a famous musician one day when I get my first cd done”. At this point, Josh has recently graduated high school and lives with his parents in between stints at the Boxelder Job Corps. He begins to upload videos discussing current events, his beliefs, and his music. He has a middle-parted bowl cut and the Norwood Reaper has yet to rear its bald head.

Josh gets in his routine of making daily videos while not at job corps, referring to his viewers as “YouTube”, and starts to take the shape of the YouTube personality as seen today. Many of Josh's earlier videos are part of a series titled “Guitar Insight”, where he explains his guitar methods and techniques while “speaking his mind” on “stupid random shit that pisses [me] off”. The majority of this content is Josh going off on various subjects including social taboos, boy bands he deemed homosexual in nature, and similar rants before ending by randomly strumming on his guitar, showing off his supposed musical prowess.

At some point during this era, Josh has brief stints working at the local Burger King, as well as a pizza restaurant. He has provided minimal detail about these two jobs. Following a video where Josh complained about the hours he got working at Burger King, a co-worker showed the video to Cobes' manager, forcing Josh to make what may have been Youtube's first apology video.

During this time, Josh debuts his first album - Blood Cemetery - Which he had to cut down from the initial twenty songs, additionally redoing a number because he lost a few of the songs. This is also the advent of what would become Josh's most well-known handle: KingCobraJFS. Combining his favorite animal with his initials, the name would cement itself as part of his legacy for years to come. Attempting to break into the music business, Josh would send a copy of his CD to Simmons Records, but to no response. Josh would continue to work on his musical ability by adding vocal covers to his repertoire, starting with Papa Roach's “Forever”.

While still under the Gothickingcobra52 moniker, Josh also introduces his ventriloquist dummy Shon during this time as a part of his comedy skit series titles “Shon and Saunders”. Shon is a Charlie McCarthy puppet that he received as a gift during childhood from his parents that Josh would give a gothic coat of paint to make him more creepy. Shon would feature as a recurring character in his early videos, seemingly as a way to critique his own actions.