Have you ever discovered an artist that you really love, only to find out that you were a little late to the game? Maybe it’s a band that broke up, maybe it’s a group that went on hiatus, or maybe it was a musician who passed away far too soon.
In every one of these cases, you undoubtedly feel some sort of longing for the days gone by, back when these artists were active, touring regularly and releasing new music. Usually, you find yourself alone in this feeling, with no one else to share your pain with as you fondly recall the glory days of your favourite musician.
But what if you weren’t alone in this feeling. What if this was a feeling shared with almost everyone you knew, and what if this artist was as much an enigma as they were an icon? Well, for countless South Africans, this described their relationship with the elusive musician that is Rodriguez for over two decades.
A hero is born
Born in Michigan in 1942 to Mexican parents, Sixto Rodriguez was an average American kid. Showing an interest in music as he grew up, this culminated in the young man chasing after a recording career of his own by the time he reached adulthood.
Performing live around his native Michigan in the late ’60s, Rodriguez gained a small following, recording his debut single under the name Rod Riguez in 1967. After a few more years of sporadic performance, Rodriguez hit the studio to record Cold Fact, his debut album.
With a folk-rock style, his lyrics and music were compared to that of Bob Dylan, and fans undoubtedly believed he was headed for the big time. However, while the album went largely unnoticed upon its release in 1970, Rodriguez persevered and hit the studio later year, releasing Coming From Reality in 1971.
Sadly, his follow-up failed to chart either and this humble artist found himself being dropped by his record label not long after.
Strangely, while Cold Fact had bombed, copies of the record made their way over to Australia just months later, where Sydney DJ Holger Brockman began to play the album on 2SM.
While Rodriguez’s profile wasn’t exactly growing over in his native America, he had already become something of a hero in Australia, with the likes of Midnight Oil’s members naming themselves as early fans of the rocker.
His profile grows
Resigned to the fact that his music career was bound to go nowhere, Rodriguez decided to turn his back on music for good, returning to his job as a construction worker.
However, while he was putting down his guitar, fans on the other side of the world began picking up his records, with fans in South Africa fast becoming fascinated by this enigmatic musician.
While the story about how Rodriguez’s music arrived in South Africa remain somewhat unclear, the generally accepted story is that an official copy arrived in the country in early 1971 thanks to an American music-lover, with bootleg copies beginning to spread like wildfire soon afterwards.
Before long, the album had became huge among South African listeners who did everything they could to track down their own copy of the record. Eventually, official copies began to circulate, though the mystery of who this musician was remained.
Rodriguez’s music became anthems of the Apartheid-era South Africa
While South Africans in the Apartheid era listened to Rodriguez’s music and relished in the themes of anti-establishment discussion soon began to take place about who he was. Where was he from? What happened to him? Why hadn’t he released any more music?
Of course, such a conundrum sounds almost silly in the internet-age, but back in mid-’70s South Africa, tracking down an elusive artist such as Rodriguez was near impossible. Apart from the information given in the liner notes (and there was precious little offered up), fans would have to rely on word-of-mouth from more learned individuals.
Sadly, with everyone repeating the rumours and innuendo that they themselves had heard, no one really learnt any more about this mysterious icon.
An unknown hero
While South Africans were struggling to find any information that they could about Rodriguez, Australian concert promoters somehow managed to track down the elusive musician.
Arriving in the country for a 15-date tour in 1979, Rodriguez’s shows were so well-received that came back just two years later for another tour of the country. However, as fate would have it, these would be his last shows for close to two decades.
Back in South Africa however, Rodriguez was bigger than Elvis. With his records selling like hotcakes, fans were still left pondering the musician’s fate. Of course, rumours began to swirl about why he had dropped off the radar. The most prominent of these was the urban legend that Rodriguez had committed suicide onstage, with only the grisly details changing between tales.
After his music was eventually reissued in South Africa in the ’90s, efforts to track down this mysterious muso ramped up and by 1998, the rise of technology meant that an internet campaign to track him down had caught the attention of Rodriguez’s daughter.
After alerting her father to these fans who were trying to contact him, an amazed Rodriguez soon agreed to tour the country, much to the delight of countless South African fans.
Playing eight shows in the country, many fans didn’t even believe that these performances were either legitimate, or even going to happen. After all, it was something of an established fact that Rodriguez had died years earlier, so who was it that was going to be taking the stage?
On June 18th, 1998, the fans got their answer as the living and breathing Rodriguez took to the stage to perform a show that many admirers of his work thought would never happen.
The second coming
Following the success of these South African shows, Rodriguez seemed to enter something of a career renaissance, with four more tours of the country occurring over the next eight years.
By 2007, Rodriguez returned to Australia for the first time in 26 years, taking the stage as part of the annual Bluesfest festival. If anything, it was clear that this long-overdue fame was finally arriving, almost 40 years after it was supposed to have occurred.
In 2012, an Oscar-winning documentary titled Searching For Sugar Man was released, depicting the obscurity of this enigmatic musician. Thanks in part to this documentary and the renewed interest that followed, Rodriguez found himself able to quit his construction job, moving into music full-time.
An acclaimed documentary soon brought the story of Rodriguez to the awaiting public
Even now, 50 years after he first entered the world of music, Rodriguez is still touring. Having recently cancelled an Australian tour due to illness, the famed musician’s life is one missed opportunities, belated fame, but seemingly, no regrets.
While he spent decades away from the fanbase that sought him out with no luck, this just made their eventual reunion all the more sweeter. After all, can you imagine discovering a favourite musician today, learning they were dead, and then finally seeing them live almost 30 years later? It’s a story you couldn’t make up.
However, Rodriguez’s story is one that will resonate for years to come, as people are left to wonder about all those stunning musicians that never made it, or have fallen through the cracks. Who knows, maybe one day they too will see a career resurgence worthy of being made into an Oscar-winning documentary. This is definitely a music industry tale worth telling over a refreshing drink!
