THE ATTIC
Stories. Poems.
Random thoughts and
measured experiments.
The things that won’t fit elsewhere.
LOST AND FOUND
If one were to rank the intrinsic value of all things, material and abstract, in ascending order, the rankings might read like so; the things we have discovered, the things we have lost forever and a third - most unique category, the things we discovered – thought we lost forever, and in happenstance, recovered.
In this third category belong things such as a family heirloom, a soldier returning from war in a distant land overwhelmed by the innocence of peace at home or a musician - once famous, thought deceased, revived by the distant peoples of an alien land, as they went searching for a soundtrack to their march against apartheid.
Sixto Rodriguez’s first album came out in 1967. He was 25 and had attracted the attentions of the power brokers in the music world as they went searching for an alternative to Bob Dylan.
And that began an epic saga of found, lost, and found again.
Over the following years, as copies of his songs, bootlegged and legal, spread across the world, travelled up and down the charts across the continents, so did Rodriguez’s fortunes.
In that time, his occupations ranged from singer-songwriter to guitarist to poet, and finally as an excavation and demolition worker. His life mirrored the story of someone Bob Dylan would have written a song about.
Before you continue please consider taking moment to...
Down in South Africa, the struggle for apartheid reached a climax and ended with Mandela walking out of prison. Elected president under a constitution and system of government accepted and adopted - for the first time since European colonial powers set their lusty sights on the Cape of Good Hope - by the people it was meant to rule over.
The end of that struggle heralded the beginning of a new one. Those who marched and were inspired to rise against apartheid to the tune of Rodriguez’s song banded together to discover their hero’s fate and uncover the mystery once and for all.
Was he lost forever? Or was he waiting to be rediscovered?
To the tune of strings being plucked on a visibly aged guitar, Sixto Rodriguez took his place on stage. For a few moments he peered through his dark glasses - before him stood thousands of fans he did not know existed, until a few months ago.In that moment – a moment bathed in anticipation, choking with emotion, surrounded by those he had inspired in their quest for freedom and rebirth, he announced he was found again.
“Thank-you for keeping me alive.”
It was 1997. Sixto Rodriguez was now 55.
In the award winning documentary listed below, you can find out more about Sixto Rodriguez and his story. Also listed is some of my favourite music by him and a song of my own that is inspired, in part, by his story.