Sixto Rodriguez: "Sugar Man"

Here you go, learn about someone you never heard of before....

I remember the first time I heard “Sugar Man,” the signature song by 60′s missing link/Latino Donovan doppelganger Rodriguez. I was in a record store about five years ago, and Rodriguez’s plaintive, pleading voice singing the title over the Spanish guitar stopped me in my tracks. This song didn’t sound like a mere hit, it sounded like a classic, and the album it comes from, 1970′s Cold Fact shows a fully-developed artist in mid-flight. But the shocking truth is Rodriguez didn’t have any hits and he never got near rock star status. Well, not in The States at least. 

In fact he was more than a just a rock star in mid-70s South Africa, he was a revolutionary cultural figure whose lyrics inspired South African bands to protest Apartheid policies. South African radio banned some of his songs, but everyone owned Rodriguez’s records and sang his tunes at barb-e-cues as a tradition. But Rodriguez never knew. If fact, no one seemed to know where Rodriguez was, and rumors spread that he committed a theatrical act of suicide on stage. Finally, in the mid-90′s, a South African record store owner and superfan decided that he was going to get to the bottom of the mystery of whatever happened to Rodriguez.