7. RodriguezComing From Reality
If you’ve seen Searching for Sugarman, you’ll know how huge Rodriguez was in South Africa without him being known well elsewhere in the world [the film tells the story of how bootleg copies of his album, Cold Fact, found their way to apartheid-era South Africa, where it became a word-of-mouth hit; he also had some success in Australia]. And believe me, he was huge in South Africa. I was a kid growing up there, and everybody had his cassette. I was thinking earlier how impossible it would be to have a story like his now in the internet age – there was this myth in South Africa that he’d committed suicide when he’d actually just gone back to Detroit and become a construction worker. I’m fascinated by music and myth-building, and how intrinsic it it to culture. Music has this special quality and we are always lifting it up. He’s still great now, though, is Rodriguez. I saw him last year at the Royal Albert Hall – he’s 80 now. He was bollocksing Trump. He totally shat on Brexit. That’s how I want to be when I’m 80!
