M4U-(RODRIGUEZ-Coming From Reality)-mistakenly rumoured to have suicided-LP

	A$		68
	$		45

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DESCRIPTION ITEM: VINYL 12" LP 33 1/3RPM
ARTIST: RODRIGUEZ
TITLE: Coming From Reality
COUNTRY: OZ
CAT No: BLUE GOOSE, MLF 269
COVER:
FRONT-(Grade at MINT-)
REAR-(Grade at EXCELLENT+ to NEAR MINT-)(see scan)
LABELS: (Grade at MINT-)
VINYL: (Grade at NEAR MINT+)
TRACKS:
? Climb Up on My Music
? A Most Disgusting Song
? I Think of You
? Heikki's Suburbia Bus Tour
? Silver Words?
? Sandrevan Lullaby-Lifestyles
? To Whom It May Concern
? It Started Out So Nice
? Halfway Up the Stairs
? Cause
COMMENT #1: sugarman.org/begin.html
The artist known simply as Rodriguez was born Sixto (pronounced "Seez-toe") Diaz Rodriguez in Detroit, Michigan, USA in 1942. He was the sixth child (the Sixth Prince) of immigrant Mexican parents. He recorded the classic album Cold Fact in Detroit in 1969, but it sank without a trace. His second album, Coming From Reality, was recorded in London in 1970 and released in 1971 with even less success. He made a huge impact on South Africans in the 70s, however, when Cold Fact was released in South Africa in 1971 and again in 1974. He toured Australia in 1979 and also in 1981. Nothing more was heard from him, and nobody seemed to know where he was, or if he was even still alive. His appeal continued and Cold Fact sold steadily through the years. He was "found" again in 1997 thanks to the internet and the perserverance of some die-hard fans, namely Craig Bartholomew and Stephen "Sugar" Segerman.

In most of the world Rodriguez has been ignored, but in South Africa, Cold Fact is very well-known, especially the songs, I Wonder and Sugar Man. Despite the cold fact that he was never played on the radio, whenever pub musicians in SA play his songs everyone sings along to poetic lyrics like ...the moon is hanging in the purple sky... or ...thanks for your time...

Everybody thought his name was Jesus because of the song credits on the album and most people believed he was dead! Then in September 1997, Eva Rodriguez posted a message on The Forum: "Rodriguez is my father! I'm serious." This led to a very successful tour of South Africa in March 1998. A live album from the tour was released in June 1998. Rodriguez played in Sweden that June and then returned to SA and played 2 nights in Johannesburg to launch the live CD. He returned to South Africa again in September 2001 for a 16-date tour.

COMMENT #2: Biography by Quint Kik
Another serious contester for the title of "artist least likely to enjoy a major career re-estimation," the story of cult enigma Rodriguez is nonetheless characterized by recurring moments of renaissance, sprawled over four decades and as many continents. Hopelessly obscure in the United States during his formative years as Detroit's answer to Dylan via Motown and Bacharach, in South Africa the artist notoriously remains a nostalgic reminder of apartheid. As Dutch national newspaper NRC Handelsblad discovered in 2005, young white South Africans who had been enlisted with the national service had embraced Rodriguez as their own counterculture Hendrix. However politically incorrect this must seem, their longing for the Vietnam era -- when smoking grass and listening to Rodriguez' thought-provoking lyrics was viewed as a means of rebelling against their own ultra-conservative government -- comes across as perfectly imaginable. As a consequence, much of his repertoire remains a big favorite of singalongs at an average "Braai", or barbecue party.

Born in Detroit in 1942, Sixto Diaz Rodriguez originated from a working-class background and dropped out of high school at the age of 16. Dividing his time between hanging around the university campus and playing assorted unconventional clubs and bars, he was introduced to Impact's Harry Balk, which led to the recording of his first single "I'll Slip Away" in 1967. When Balk took off for a career as a creative director at Motown, session players and ardent Rodriguez supporters Dennis Coffey and Mike Theodore put him under the attention of Clarence Avant. About to set up his Sussex label, the latter was genuinely impressed with the artist's take on Detroit street life and supplied Theo-Coff Productions with sufficient means to cut an album's worth of material. Naturally, Theodore and Coffey took up keyboard and guitar duties, in addition to employing second wave Motown Funk Brothers for a rhythm section. Recording Rodriguez separately, they afterwards matched his voice and acoustic guitar to a sonic palette of various orchestrations and psychedelic effects. Being Sussex' first release, the resulting Cold Fact was a stone-cold folk-rock classic with an otherworldly feel to it.

Though industry-wise it was met with positive reviews, commercially the album gathered only dust. Theories as to why it didn't catch on in the climate of socially conscientious albums like Cloud Nine and What's Going on range from either not being played by underground radio and thus not meeting its intended public, or insufficient marketing by Buddah, with whom Sussex had a promotion and distribution deal. Though subsequently concentrating on Bill Withers, Avant offered Rodriguez the chance to record a follow-up in London with Steve Rowland (renowned for Family Dog's "Sympathy"). When 1971's Coming from Reality met a similar fate as its predecessor, the artist left the music business to enroll at university, in between working construction to support his family. End of story, you would think, but unbeknown to Rodriguez, he definitely wouldn't be left to reside in the "where are they now files".

COMMENT #3: Wikipedia
Sixto Díaz Rodríguez (also known as Rodríguez or as Jesús Rodríguez; born July 10, 1942) is an American folk musician, based out of Detroit, Michigan. His career initially proved short-lived with two little-sold albums in the early 1970s and some brief touring in Australia. Unbeknownst to him, however, his work proved extremely successful and influential in South Africa, although he was mistakenly rumoured in that country to have committed suicide.

In the 1990s, determined South African fans managed to seek out and contact him, leading to an unexpected revival of his musical career. Their story is told in the 2012 documentary, Searching for Sugar Man, which has also helped give Rodríguez a measure of fame in his native country.

Early life
Rodríguez was born in Detroit, Michigan. He was named 'Sixto' (pronounced seesto or seexto) because he was the sixth child in his family. Rodríguez's parents were working-class immigrants who had come to the US from Mexico in the 1920s. In most of his songs he takes a political stance on the cruelties facing the inner city poor.

Rodriguez earned a Bachelor of Arts in philosophy from Wayne State University's Monteith College in 1981.[1]

Domestic record career
In 1967 (under the name Rod Riguez) he released the single "I'll Slip Away" through the small label Impact. He did not produce anything for another three years until he was signed to Sussex Records, an offshoot of A&M records.

It was after the move to Sussex that he changed his professional name to just Rodríguez. Rodríguez recorded two albums with Sussex: Cold Fact in 1970 and Coming from Reality in 1971. But after both of his albums sold very few copies, he was quickly dropped from the label, which folded in 1975. At the time of his firing, Rodríguez was in the process of completing an album that has yet to be released.
After this happened, Sixto discontinued his music career and stayed in Detroit. There, he worked in several industries that revolved around manual labor such as demolition, yet always stayed close to a state of poverty. Having remained politically active and motivated to improve the lives of the city's working class inhabitants, Sixto registered and ran for city council in Detroit in 1989. However, the county misspelled his name on the ballot.[2]
It was revealed in 2013 that Sixto has written 30 new songs and is in discussions with Steve Rowland, the producer behind some of his old albums. "I've written about thirty new songs," Sixto told Rolling Stone magazine. "He told me to send him a couple of tapes, so I'm gonna do that. I certainly want to look him up, because now he's full of ideas."[3]

Belated fame abroad
After failing to make an impact in North America, Rodríguez gave up his career as a musician. However, although he was relatively unknown in his home country, by the mid-1970s, his albums were starting to gain airplay in South Africa, Botswana, Rhodesia, New Zealand, and Australia.

After imported copies of his Sussex albums ran dry, an Australian record label, Blue Goose Music, bought the Australian rights to his back catalogue in the mid-1970s. Blue Goose released his two studio albums plus a compilation album At His Best (featuring unreleased recordings from 1973 "Can't Get Away", "I'll Slip Away" [a rerecording of his first single], and "Street Boy").

With a new buzz around Rodriguez, in 1979 he toured Australia with the Mark Gillespie Band as support. Two shows from the tour were later released on the Australian-only album Alive—the title being a play on the rumours caused by his public obscurity that he had died years ago. After the ’79 tour, he returned to Australia for a final tour in 1981 with Midnight Oil before quietly slipping back into normal life.

Unbeknownst to Rodríguez, "At His Best" went platinum in South Africa, which at one stage was the major disk-press interest supplying his music to the rest of the world. He would often be compared to successful contemporaries such as Bob Dylan. Additionally, some of his songs came to serve as anti-Apartheid anthems in South Africa,[4] where his work influenced many musicians who protested the government. It has been reported that anti-apartheid activist Steve Biko was a Rodríguez fan.[5]

In 1991, both his albums were released on CD in South Africa for the first time, which helped perpetuate his already existent fame. However, even in South Africa, few details of his life were known to his fans and it was widely rumored and believed that Rodríguez had killed himself during a concert in the 1970s.

Despite the magnitude of his success abroad, Rodríguez's fame in South Africa had remained completely unknown to him until 1998, when his eldest daughter came across a website dedicated to him.[6] After coming into contact with the authors of the website and learning of his long-standing fame in the country, Sixto played his first South African tour, playing six concerts in front of thousands of fans. A documentary about the tour, Dead Men Don't Tour: Rodríguez in South Africa 1998, was later screened on SABC TV in 2001. Later he played in Sweden before returning to South Africa in 2001 and 2005.

In 1998, his signature song, "Sugar Man", was covered by the South African rock band Just Jinjer. In 2002, the song was used by DJ David Holmes to open his mix album Come Get It I Got It, gaining Rodríguez international airplay again. "Sugar Man" had previously been sampled in the song "You're Da Man" from rapper Nas' 2001 album Stillmatic.[7]

In April 2007 and 2010, he returned to Australia to play the East Coast Blues & Roots Music Festival,[8] as well as shows in Melbourne and Sydney. His song "Sugar Man" was featured in the 2006 film Candy, starring Heath Ledger. Cornish singer-songwriter, Ruarri Joseph, covered Rodríguez's song "Rich Folks Hoax" for his third studio album. Rodríguez now continues to tour in various countries.

Rodríguez's albums Cold Fact and Coming from Reality were re-released by Light in the Attic Records in 2009.[9]

Recent success in the United States
Since the theatrical release of Searching for Sugar Man in 2012, Rodríguez has experienced a flush of media exposure and fan interest in the United States, as well as Europe. Most prominently, perhaps, Rodríguez appeared as a musical guest on the Late Show with David Letterman on August 14, 2012 performing "Crucify Your Mind", and later performed "Can't Get Away" on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno on Friday, Jan 11, 2013.

Prominent news coverage has included a mid-August 2012 CNN feature story with an interview of Rodríguez discussing his life and career resurgence. Even more notably, on October 7, 2012 Rodríguez was featured on the highly-rated U.S. TV news program 60 Minutes.[10] On November 18, 2012 Rodríguez was interviewed on the UK Sunday morning topical news program The Andrew Marr Show, where also played a short song over the closing credits. Additionally, he has performed on the web on such notable web series as "The Weekly Comet".

On September 3, 2012, a Change.org petition was launched to have Rodríguez awarded a Kennedy Center Honor.

In addition to concerts in Australia and South Africa, Rodríguez's current tour schedule for 2013 includes his most notable US concerts to date, such as a stint at the Beacon Theatre in New York City in April and a spot at this year's Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival in Indio, California.

Searching for Sugar Man
In 2012, the Sundance Film Festival hosted the premiere of the documentary film Searching for Sugar Man, from Swedish director Malik Bendjelloul, detailing the efforts of two South African fans to see if his rumored death was true—and if not, to discover what had become of him. The Simon Chinn- and John Battsek-produced documentary went on to win the World Cinema Special Jury Prize and the Audience Award, World Cinema Documentary.[11] In addition to playing at other films festivals including the True/False Film Festival and the Traverse City Film Festival , the film opened in New York and Los Angeles on July 27, 2012, before a larger domestic theatrical run.[12] It was also screened as part of cinema programs in some European music festivals during the summer of 2012, including the Way Out West festival in August, where Rodríguez also performed. In November it won both the Audience Award and the Best Music Documentary Award at the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam.[13]

The Searching for Sugar Man soundtrack features a compilation of Rodríguez tracks from his Cold Fact and Coming from Reality albums, in addition to a previously unreleased single from his third album. The album was released on July 24, 2012.[14]

On January 13th, Searching for Sugar Man was nominated for Best Documentary at the Academy Awards.[15] It has also been nominated for a BAFTA Award for Best Documentary.

VINYL GRADING SYSTEM

MINT:
RECORD: New condition with no surface marks or loss of sound quality.
COVER: New condition with no surface marks, creases or wear.
NEAR MINT:
RECORD: Barely noticeable surface mark with no loss of sound quality.
COVER: Barely noticeable surface mark/ wear.
EXCELLENT:
RECORD: Some signs of being played with extremely little if no loss of sound quality.
COVER: Slight wear or creasing.
VERY GOOD:
RECORD: Obviously been played with noticeable surface marks & the occasional light scratches but exhibits no major loss of sound quality.
COVER: Noticeable wear on cover, seam or spine.
GOOD:
RECORD: Very obviously been played with very noticeable surface marks & exhibits major loss of sound quality.
COVER: Noticeable folding, scuffing of spine or edges, splits in seams or spine or fading of colour.
FAIR:
RECORD: Still just playable & exhibits considerable surface noise.
COVER: Major tears, wearing, splits & stains.
POOR:
RECORD: Will not play properly due to scratches etc.
COVER: Very badly damaged.
+(PLUS)/-(MINUS):
Slightly up or down in condition as appears in the comments above.
NOTE:
Gradings are done visually unless there appears to be a questionable surface mark on the vinyl, it is then put on the turntable to check. A comment describing the outcome will appear if this is the case.

BULK POSTAGE SAVINGS

WITHIN AUSTRALIA

Registered post covers compensation up to $100.00 AUD.
A registered mail option will appear on your invoice.

1 LP:
ALL AUSTRALIAN STATES=$8.95

2-3LPs:
NSW=$11.95
VIC=$14.95
QLD/SA/TAS=$16.95
NT/WA=$17.95

4-17 LPs:
NSW (4-7 LPs) =$12.95
NSW (8-11 LPs) =$13.95
NSW (12-14 LPs) =$14.95
NSW (15-17 LPs) =$15.95
ALL OTHER STATES=$18.95 (5kg Prepaid Parcel Post Satchel)

NOTE:
Double albums count as 2 LPs; triple albums count as 3 LPs etc

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NOTE: For parcels over 2.00kg (8 or more LPs) OR of value over $100.00AUD, there will be a need for INSURANCE, which is an extra $8.95 AUD added to the basic post cost. Email me for exact costs.

Prices below are for REGISTERED POST

RUSSIAN FEDERATION RESIDENTS ONLY:
Please DO NOT pay for this until I send you an invoice.
Due to an eBay system fault/limitation with their postage calculator, the postage cost to you is NOT “Asia/Pacific” cost BUT “Rest of World” cost.
Refer to POSTAGE COSTS below for the “Rest of World” cost.
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1 LP:
NEW ZEALAND=$19.95
ASIA/PACIFIC=$22.95
AMERICAS/MIDDLE EAST=$24.95
REST OF WORLD=$28.95

2-3 LPs:
NEW ZEALAND=$27.95
ASIA/PACIFIC=$33.95
AMERICAS/MIDDLE EAST=$38.95
REST OF WORLD=$49.95

4-7 LPs or more:
Email me for current Registered post cost.

NOTE:
Double albums count as 2 LPs; triple albums count as 3 LPs etc

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