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Interviews with news makers and discussion of topics important to Southwest Michigan. Subscribe to the podcast through Apple itunes and Google. Segments of interview are heard in WestSouthwest Brief during Morning Edition and All Things Considered

Kalamazoo Show Planned for Acclaimed Protest Singer Sixto Rodriguez, Star of 'Sugar Man' Film

JJ Hall / flicker.com

Note: Updated to include Saturday's Arts & More audio, with songs.

Imagine giving up your dreams of a music career in the belief that your first two albums didn't sell well.  So, you work in hard manual labor jobs for the next nearly 30 years only to find out that, all along, while not a hit in America, your albums had made you a mega star in Australia and South Africa but you never see a dime. It happened to protest folk singerSixtoRodriguez of Detroit. But a film about him has reversed his fortune. He performs Dec. 11 at the Kalamazoo StateTheatre

In an advance telephone interview, the 73-year-old Mexican-American guitarist and songwriter talks with EarleneMcMichael for two of WMUK's shows, Arts & More and WestSouthwest, about the details behind his rise to fame late in life. The soft-spoken Rodriguez, a man of few words, is not bitter about his delayed acclaim.

"I look on the cheery side of things," he says in the interview.

Sixto Rodriguez, who performs professionally as Rodriguez, released his "Cold Fact" album in 1970, followed by "Coming From Reality" in 1971.  He has been called a “Latin Bob Dylan”for his frank lyrics about social issues, racial inequality among them.

Despite disappointing album sales in the U.S. that led his record company to drop him, Rodriguez's music somehow found its way abroad, where the reception was far warmer. In fact, Rodriguez had reached the cult status in racially-tense South Africa said to be on the level of the Rolling Stones and Elvis. 

wsw-120315-rodriguez-web.mp3
Longer interview on WestSouthwest (12/3/15)

His strongest following was among young whites there who disapproved of what they saw as their country's repressive ways. They also disliked its apartheid system, the government-sanctioned program of racial discrimination against blacks.  

Some of those youthful whites who enjoyed his music were malcontent soldiers in the South African Army, Rodriguez tells McMichael. He adds that he has also come to learn that his tunes made their way to legendary anti-apartheid leader Steve Biko before his death in the ‘70s, and that he had liked them.

Sugar-Man-Sample.mp3
"Sugar Man" song by Rodriguez ("Cold Fact" album, 1970)

Rodriguez gave up being a professional musician in the mid-1970s. He did a few shows in Australia in 1979 and 1981 after being invited, after which he resumed his life of odd jobs.

It wasn't until the late 1990s that he would come to know about his other huge fan base in South Africa. One of his three daughters had stumbled across a website that two avid Rodriguez admirers created in hopes of tracking down their idol. Rodriguez called them. He subsequently sold-out all six consecutive performances in 1998 at a 5,000-seat venue in South Africa.

People had assumed Rodriguez was dead in part because they had never seen him perform; it has been speculated that it was easy for such rumors to go unchecked as the Internet was not yet commonplace.

The documentary “Searching for Sugar Man” about the hunt for Rodriguez won an Oscar in 2013. Album sales spiked, and Rodriguez now plays far larger locales than his small night clubs of yesteryear. 

While Rodriguez has notreceived royalties from the previous sales of his albums overseas, he will from his songs that have since been re-released under a different label. 

Rodriguez delivers a one-night-only show at 8 p.m. Dec. 11 at the Kalamazoo StateTheatre

This story aired on WestSouthwest at 9:30 a.m. & 3:30 p.m. Thursday (12/3). It will re-air Saturday around 10:45 a.m. after "Wait, Wait...Don't Tell Me" (12/5).

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