Sixto Rodriguez, who has died aged 81, was a Mexican-American singer with a remarkable history. He recorded a couple of albums under the name Rodriguez in the early 1970s, but they flopped and he was forced to follow a series of other careers, including work on a construction site. He lived modestly, with no car or phone, and never realised that he had become a hero in apartheid-era South Africa, where his records were bestsellers, but where his identity was shrouded in mystery.
There were bizarre stories that he had killed himself on stage or suffered a drug overdose – until two South African fans tracked him down in Detroit in 1996, which led to his unexpected musical resurrection. In 1998 he made a triumphant tour of South Africa, when he sang to thousands of fans that he had never known to exist.
