Can you imagine that there’s an American artist who has been more famous than Elvis in one part of the world, but you’ve never heard of him? There is, and his name is Sixto Diaz Rodriguez, known professionally as Rodriguez. The strangest thing about him is that even he didn’t know that particular fact. He had a short-lived career in the United States, but unknown to the author himself his albums became extremely successful and influential in South Africa, outnumbering the sales of Elvis Presley records there. In 1967, using the name "Rod Riguez," he released a single, "I'll Slip Away," on the Impact label. He signed with Sussex Records in 1970, when he started using his preferred professional name, "Rodriguez." He recorded two albums, “Cold Fact” in 1970 and “Coming from Reality” in 1971. Both records sold only a few copies in the US, and he was quickly dropped by the label, which itself closed in 1975. Rodriguez soon after that quit his music career and continued working in demolition and production line work, which earned him very little income.But his records got a new life, not only in South Africa, but also in Australia, Botswana, New Zealand, and Zimbabwe. When imported copies of his Sussex albums were sold out, an Australian record label, “Blue Goose Music,” bought the Australian rights to his recordings. Blue Goose released his two studio albums as well as a compilation album, “At His Best,” featuring unreleased recordings from 1973. “At His Best” went platinum in South Africa, which at one stage was the primary disc-press source of his music to the rest of the world. Rodriguez’s songs served as anti-Apartheid anthems in South Africa, where his work influenced artists protesting against the government, among which was the anti-apartheid activist Steve Biko, who was also a Rodriguez fan.Rodriguez didn’t know about his fame in those parts of the world until 1997 when his older daughter came across a website dedicated to her father. The site was called 'The Great Rodriguez Hunt,' with the intention of finding any information about the mysterious US musician, set up by Stephen "Sugar" Segerman. The same year, Brian Currin established 'Climb Up On My Music,' a tribute site to the life and works of Rodriguez. After contacting the website and learning of his popularity in South Africa, the singer went on his first South African tour, playing six concerts before thousands of fans. A documentary, “Dead Men Don't Tour: Rodriguez in South Africa 1998,” was screened on SABC TV in 2001. He also performed in Sweden before returning to South Africa in 2001 and 2005m in Australia in 2007 and 2010, but also in the US where his fame rose after the release of the film “Searching for Sugar Man” in 2012, a film focused on the story of two Cape Town fans in the late 1990s, Stephen "Sugar" Segerman and Craig Bartholomew Strydom, to find out whether the rumoured death of American musician Sixto Rodriguez was true and, if not, to discover what had become of him. On 10 February 2013, the film won the BAFTA Award for Best Documentary at the 66th British Academy Film Awards in London, and two weeks later it won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature at the 85th Academy Awards in Hollywood.
