Sugar Man finds himself in Victoria
What: Rodriguez Where: Royal Theatre When: 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday Tickets: Sold out
If you don’t already have tickets to see the mysterious star of Searching for Sugar Man, you’re out of luck.
The cult sensation known as Rodriguez promptly sold out his Friday and Saturday solo shows at the Royal Theatre after they were announced. All tickets for the 74-year-old’s Monday night concert at Vancouver’s Orpheum Theatre were also snapped up.
After years in obscurity, many spent as a manual demolition worker in Detroit, Sixto (pronounced “Seez-toe”) Rodriguez emerged as pop’s most unlikely late bloomer. His is a curious Cinderella tale — one writer deemed him “the artist least likely to enjoy a major career re-estimation.”
The 2012 documentary Searching for Sugar Man chronicles the folk-rock singer-songwriter’s belated rise to international fame. It follows the efforts of super-fans Stephen (Sugar) Segerman and Craig Bartholomew Strydom in the late 1990s to discover what had become of Rodriguez.
Rumoured to have committed suicide decades ago, the musician released two albums in the early 1970s that were commercial failures despite critical acclaim (the first, Cold Fact, received a fourstar review in Billboard magazine).
Discouraged at his lack of U.S. success, Rodriguez bought an abandoned house in Detroit for $50 and found work in construction. Unbeknownst to him, his albums — originally smuggled in as bootlegs — became best-sellers in South Africa. In the 1970s and ’80s, he was viewed there as a superstar in the ranks of the Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan. In that country, Rodriguez’s lyrics especially struck a chord, with some songs regarded as antiapartheid anthems.
In the late 1990s, Rodriguez, learning of his popularity, undertook his first South African tours (Rolling Stone magazine reported that one earned him a cool $700,000 US). The subsequent release of the Academy Awardwinning Searching for Sugar Man triggered widespread interest in North America and Europe. Rodriguez appeared on David Letterman’s and Jay Leno’s talk shows. He performed at topdrawer events such as Glastonbury Festival and the Montreux Jazz Festival.
For someone who had earned a hard-scrabble living tearing buildings apart, it was an amazing turnaround.
Here are a few essential facts about Rodriguez, the soft-spoken underdog who found American Idol-level stardom late in life:
• He has humble origins. A sixth child (hence his given name Sixto), Rodriguez was born to working-class folk who immigrated to the U.S. from Mexico in the 1920s.
• His career started early. In 1967, he recorded the dreamily pensive single I’ll Slip Away, under the moniker Rod Riguez. However, his record company lost interest when Rodriguez said he preferred to perform with his back facing the audience.
• His first album, Cold Fact, included contributions from such stellar musicians as bassist Bob Babbitt, who went on to play with Stevie Wonder, Jimi Hendrix and the Temptations, and drummer Andrew Smith, who later played with Marvin Gaye and the Plastic Ono Band.
• Australia loves Rodriguez almost as much as South Africa. Although it’s not mentioned in the documentary (perhaps because it might lesson the impact of his South Africa comeback performances), Rodriguez has a big fan base in Oz.
He first toured Australia in 1979. The singer, who’d until then only played for small crowds, was frightened at the prospect of appearing gigging for thousands. In their 2015 book Sugar Man, Strydom and Segerman write: “. . . he walked the streets late at night unable to sleep and he sat nervously shaking in a taxi for 15 minutes before taking the stage at Melbourne’s Dallas Brooks Hall for his first concert.”
• He’s an educated man with a strong social conscience. Rodriguez graduated from Wayne State University in 1981 with a bachelor’s degree in philosophy (in 2013 the university gave him an honorary doctorate). He has run unsuccessfully for public office in Detroit numerous times, including one bid for mayor.
• He loves playing cover tunes. Although Rodriguez has sufficient original material for a full concert, he likes to reinterpret other people’s songs. For instance, he has been known to cover Like a Rolling Stone by Bob Dylan (a big influence), Blue Suede Shoes and I Only Have Eyes for You.
• The trappings of showbiz do not excite him. The director of Searching for Sugar Man, Malik Bendjelloul, invited Rodriguez to the Oscars, where the film won best documentary in 2013. The singer not only declined, he was snoozing when the win was announced.
(Ironically, given the early rumours of Rodriguez’s suicide, Bendjelloul killed himself in 2014 by throwing himself in front of a train. The 29-year-old Swedish filmmaker suffered from depression.)
• He cannot see well. Rodriguez has glaucoma and can only see people in the first few rows of his shows. He is typically helped onto the stage.