For most of the last two years, South African house heads knew him as DJ Influence: an 11, then 12 year old kid who could beat-match ten tracks in four minutes on 5FM's airwaves and had somehow earned the backing of Black Coffee himself. That name is retired now. The record he just put out on DanceAfrika carries a new one: MPILOZA.
How did a two-year-old lose his sight to cancer?
Mpilo Ntsika Shoba was diagnosed with bilateral retinoblastoma, a rare cancer of the retina that almost exclusively strikes very young children, before his second birthday. The tumours did not respond to treatment and doctors removed both eyes to stop the cancer spreading. He now wears prosthetic eyes and has been in remission since 2016. His mother, TV personality Phumeza Shoba, has been direct about what that period did to the family: "Never look at your situation and think it's over. As long as you're still breathing, there's always a chance things will turn around."
How does a blind DJ actually mix?
Mpilo learned Braille shortly after starting school in 2022, and the same tactile logic carries over to his decks: the buttons and jog wheels on his controller are marked with tape and raised points so he can find a channel, a cue point or an EQ knob by touch alone, then rely on his ear for the rest. His father Mnqobi "Shota" Shoba, a working music producer, has said the family never pushed this as a career move. "We're not launching Mpilo as a DJ to make money," he said. "We're doing it because he loves music." What Shota did push was the genre: Mpilo tried amapiano first, decided it wasn't for him, and gravitated to the more layered, percussive world of Afro-tech instead.
"He just knows what to choose, which is far too deep for his age."
That's Phumeza, describing her son's track selection, not his backstory.
Why does Black Coffee's backing matter?
Black Coffee, born Nkosinathi Maphumulo, is a close friend of Shota's, and the family calls him "uncle Nathi." He's mentored Mpilo directly rather than just posting a supportive quote, including a joint b2b set at Shota's 50th birthday party that Mpilo later described on Instagram as "so much fun" and a chance to take "notes from my uncle." For an Afro House scene where credibility is handed down through exactly this kind of apprenticeship, from Black Coffee's own Durban and Johannesburg circles outward, that endorsement carries real weight beyond the novelty of the story. It's also why, when Mpilo got his first booking outside South Africa, headlining the inaugural Yacht Episodes party in Ibiza on 31 August 2025 alongside international names, nobody in the scene treated it as a stunt.
What's next for MPILOZA?
The rebrand lands with his first real production credit. "Rise From The Darkness," a collaboration with South African producer Sundile, came out on the Afro House label DanceAfrika on 15 August 2026, with a remix following on 4 September. It's a small release by catalogue standards, but it's the first time Mpilo's music exists as a line item next to another working artist's, not as a viral clip of a kid mixing well for his age. That's the actual shift behind the name change: DJ Influence was a story people shared. MPILOZA is a producer people can book, license and credit like anyone else on DanceAfrika's roster.
Why it matters: The move from viral kid DJ to credited artist on a real Afro House label is the difference between a feel-good news segment and an actual foothold in the genre's release pipeline, and it says something about how the scene, led by figures like Black Coffee, chooses to extend mentorship.
What we think: The inspirational framing writes itself, and outlets have leaned on it hard. What's more interesting to us is that DanceAfrika put his name on a release next to Sundile's rather than treating him as a charity feature. That's the detail worth watching as MPILOZA's catalogue grows.
