Called by God, devoted TO MUMMY

MICASA’S sexy J’Something looks much older than 23 – his demeanour tells a story of maturity and wisdom. And his life journey is inspiring. His real name is Joao

– quite a tongue twister.

“It is John in Portuguese. Many folk can’t pronounce it so I adopted J’Something,” he says grinning.

The MiCasa lead vocalist was born in Portugal and moved to Port Alfred, Eastern Cape, with his parents when he was seven. But he was raised as the only child of a single mom after his parents separated.

As he grew older he tried to hold onto his Portuguese identity by using the I’m

“European pick-up line when

” he flirted with girls.

“It worked for a little while,” he laughs. But his great love is his mom.

“Her name is Maria. She’s also known as Lisa,” he says fondly. The word love’ is

“‘ something I reserve for her. So many people use it so loosely – I’ve never told another woman I love her cos the love

’ I feel for my mom is so deep.

“You can’t say that to just anyone.” He bows his head for a few seconds.

“If you knew the things my mom and I have been through you’d understand. I never felt the absence of my dad. He’d throw her out of the house and she’d take me with, with nothing but a few blankets.

“We ’ d go to the park, where she’d make a tent and tell me we’re camping for the night.

“We ’ d count the stars and she’d tell me stories.

“Despite her pain, she did this to protect me.

“She’s a Latino woman who takes no crap. She worked long hours to make sure I was looked after. There’s nothing she doesn’t know about me.

“She is my rock – she’s never seen me perform but I know she’s my biggest fan.”

He smiles but there are tears in his eyes.

He first played a guitar when he was a kid: Man, I

“remember putting on music shows for my mom and her friends. They’d pay R5 to watch us perform.

“I’d recruit these two white boys down the road to sing back-up. “I had to be the lead. “No one in the family sang or listened to music. But there was this guy who played a white electric guitar at Butlers restaurant where my mom worked. I fell in love with it and begged mom to ask him to teach me to play.

“She got me a second-hand acoustic guitar... but he died six months later and my love for music died with him,” he says sadly.

But when he was much older his destiny was revealed to him: I’m not much of a

“church person. I was standing outside boarding school smoking and chatting up a girl when I was called to come to a cell service.

“I thought I was in trouble for standing with this chick and smoking. Hahaha!

“But as I walk into the service this prophetess stops preaching and points at me, telling me God wants me to make music because I have a gift. I thought she was going on about nothing but she told me I played the guitar.

“I remembered playing as a child. I was blown away that she knew that. I bought myself a guitar and soon I was leading church services of 2 000 people. “We even had a rapper. “Before I knew it, I was leading worship sessions. But that went awfully wrong...”

Joao says he idolised the wrong people and their ideas and lost his confidence.

“This group made me believe that the girl I was with was wrong for me because she was of a different faith and made me date someone I felt nothing for. I left the Church for a long time,” he says.

He recorded acoustic albums and won a singing competition at varsity, but he still didn’t think he could make a career out of music.

He moved to Jozi after being convinced to do so by a distant uncle who worked at Soul Candi records and managed the studio for a while, while also trying his hand at songwriting. It wasn’t until late last year when he