Rodriguez

It’s not often that an artist plays a sold-out, 5,000 capacity venue at the age of 70. It’s even less common that an artist does this feat having only released two studio albums that, initially, sold poorly.

But, that is what Rodriguez did at Hammersmith Apollo on Friday.

Rodriguez (birth name Sixto Rodriguez) is a Detroit-born singer-songwriter who was thought to be the next Bob Dylan (a frequent comparison), but his albums sold very little on their initial release in the early 70’s.

Read more at Review – Rodriguez @ Hammersmith Apollo, London, June 8 2013 | Young & Serious.

The Detroit musician will however perform on the 8th July in the Poble Espanyol in Barcelona.

Those of you who have a day ticket for the Saturday 25th May in Barcelona or Friday 31st May in Porto and who in the light of Rodriguez’s cancellation no longer want to go to the event will be able to exchange their day ticket for a ticket valid for his concert on the 8th July in Barcelona. In order to do so you will have to send an email from Monday 20th until Friday 24th May to portal@primaverasound.com with the subject “ Rodriguez concert”. After this deadline you will receive a ticket that you will have to present on the day of the concert along with the corresponding unused day ticket. If your ticket has been used to get into the festival you will not be allowed into the concert.

Those of you who have a full festival ticket or a day ticket for Saturday 25th May in Barcelona and who decide to attend the festival anyway, will have the opportunity to buy a ticket for the Rodriguez concert at the price of 5€. These tickets will only be on sale on the Saturday 25th at the festival ticket offices from midday until 10 pm or until they sell out. It will only be possible to buy one ticket per person on presentation of a full festival card or day card and correctly worn bracelet.

At the Barcelona edition the recently reformed band Chucho, fronted by Fernando Alfaro, will substitute the American singer songwriter on Saturday 25th May in the Parc del Fòrum. We will shortly be announcing who will substitute the artist on Friday 31st May at Optimus Primavera Sound in Porto.

via RODRIGUEZ CANCELS HIS APPEARANCE AT PRIMAVERA SOUND AND WILL GIVE A CONCERT ON THE 8th JULY IN BARCELONA.

Rodriguez Feature in Uncut July 2013 (click on image for full article)

Sixto Rodriguez performs during a sold out concert at the Masonic Temple in Detroit on Saturday, May 18, 2013. The “Searching for Sugar Man” star is performing for his biggest home crowd ever. | Jarrad Henderson/Detroit Free Press

You could practically feel the buzz crackling inside the Masonic Temple Theatre Saturday night, where Rodriguez hit the stage for a triumphant homecoming night.

It was an apt setting, just down the road from his longtime Woodbridge home and near the bars where he’d plied his trade before finally breaking into the wider public consciousness via the film “Searching for Sugar Man.”

Greeted by a long standing ovation from the capacity crowd of 4,400 — fans ready to be as enchanted as they’d been by the film — Rodriguez opened the show with “Climb Up on My Music,” first of the decades-old songs that have suddenly found a resonant new life.

Read more at Sixto Rodriguez takes Detroit stage to enchant hometown crowd | Detroit Free Press | freep.com.

Rolling Stone France

Rodriguez Courtesy of Malik Bendjelloul/Sony Pictures Classics

Could some answers finally be on the way for Sixto Rodriguez?

After decades of murkiness about his record sales and royalties, a legal and accounting team has begun an inquiry for the enigmatic singer-songwriter, the Free Press has learned.

The move comes as 70-year-old Rodriguez gears up for the biggest hometown show of his career, tonight at the sold-out Masonic Temple Theatre in Detroit.

Read more at Sixto Rodriguez pursues review of contracts, sales in search of royalties | Detroit Free Press | freep.com.

Rodriguez | Photo: Kyndell Harkness, Star Tribune

He seemed frail when escorted onstage by two women Wednesday at the sold-out Fitzgerald Theater in St. Paul. But then he put on his dark-tinted glasses, his floppy black hat and his beige guitar and suddenly he transformed into Rodriguez, musician of mystery, melancholy and that Oscar-winning movie.

“Searching for Sugar Man,” which took the Academy Award this year for best documentary, told the story of an obscure Detroit folk-rock singer whose two albums from the early 1970s had somehow made him into a beloved cult hero in South Africa. Two obsessive fans there started searching for the singer, thought to be dead, and not only found him in Detroit but then brought him to South Africa for a series of major concerts in the late 1990s. It was all filmed and eventually turned into a 2012 movie.

It’s a fascinating story and a terrific footnote in rock history — that Rodriguez’s career was relaunched by an Oscar-honored movie.

And Rodriguez’s concert at the Fitzgerald was as winning as the movie. Maybe more so.

Read more at Rodriguez is sweeter than sugar, man | StarTribune.com.

Rodriguez

“I just want to be treated like an ordinary….legend”

With these words, offered in in humility and a little jest, Rodriguez took the stage for the encore of his May 4, 2013 show at the University of Texas’ Frank Irwin Center in Austin, Texas.  The show was an embodiment of a dream fulfilled that was brilliantly depicted in the Malik Bendjelloul documentary Searching for Sugar Man.

Malik Bendjelloul is a Swedish filmmaker who was traveling the world looking for an amazing story when he stumbled into South Africa and learned about the legendary Rodriguez.  His album “Cold Fact” and its follow up “Coming From Reality” sold over 500,000 albums in the African country.  It is credited with helping rally the youth to become anti-establishment and critical of their own government so as to stand and fight against the dark practice of apartheid.  To any South African, Rodriguez was, and is, bigger than Elvis or the Beatles.

Read more at ZekeFilm | After the Show: Searching for Sugar Man.

Paul Massaron and Sandra Hughes O’Brien, members of the Wayne State University Board of Governors, put the sash on Sixto Rodriguez during commencement ceremonies at Ford Field. (David Coates/The Detroit News)

Detroit — The Detroit musician who’s suddenly become one of Wayne State University’s more prominent alumni wished the class of 2013 good luck Thursday as he received an honorary degree from the school.

In a short speech thanking the University, musician Sixto Rodriguez wished the graduating students from Wayne State University good luck.

“Well done,” said Rodriguez told students taking commencement Thursday at Detroit’s Ford Field. “Or as we say in Spanish, ‘bien hecho.’”

Rodriguez, who garnered international fame this year after starring in the Oscar-winning documentary “Searching for Sugar Man,” was presented with an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree at the ceremony for his “musical genius and commitment to social justice.”

Rodriguez’s two albums in the early 1970s received little attention in the U.S. but he unknowingly developed a cult following in South Africa during the apartheid era.

Read more at ‘Sugar Man’ Sixto Rodriguez tells WSU grads ‘well done’ | The Detroit News | detroitnews.com.

Rodriguez performs at Lincoln Hall in Chicago, in September, 2012 (Photo credit: Barry Brecheisen/Invision/AP)

Hey Folks! Here’s a friendly reminder to set your time clocks for Thursday, May 9 at 10 AM EST (Eastern Standard Time) and click on the live stream link – http://wayne.edu/live/ – to cheer on Rodriguez as he receives his honorary doctorate – Doctor of Humane Letters – from his alma mater Wayne State University during the university’s 10 AM commencement ceremony. Here’s a world time converter link: http://www.worldtimeserver.com/convert_time_in_BR-GO.aspx. And in your browser, please type in Change.org Sixto Rodriguez Kennedy Center; scroll down the page to find the petition link; click on the link; and sign the petition to nominate Rodriguez for a Kennedy Center Honor in Washington, D.C. 4,265 people have already done so and as of today (May 6, 2013), there’s 735 signatures needed. Please spread the word through your social media networks to get these 735 signatures and finish the petition – together, we can do this!