Rodriguez - Coming From Reality / 180 gram vinyl LP

For his second album, Rodriguez decamped to London at the request of producer Steve Rowland, who had heard Cold Fact and wanted to produce him. Since Cold Fact had made little in the way of commercial movement, Rodriguez jumped at the opportunity. Session musicians like renowned guitarist Chris Spedding lent a hand on production, which was overseen by Steve Rowland. (Curiously, the latter would go on to use about half of Cold Fact for Family Dogg's oddity The View from Roland's Head.) By far not as striking as his debut, Coming from Reality offers up some haunting stream-of-consciousness gems in "Sandrevan Lullaby" and "Cause." 

Rodriguez's lyrics still come off as mildly anti-establishment; "Heikki's Suburbia Bus Tour" apparently recalls a trip Rodriguez and friends undertook to Grosse Pointe to retaliate against the rich folks who often came to the inner city of Detroit to make fun of the hippies. He also spends lots of time with the low life, as he reminisces in the prologue to "A Most Disgusting Song": "I've played every kind of gig there is to play now/I've played faggot bars, hooker bars, motorcycle funerals, opera houses, concert houses, halfway houses." Slightly more slick than the debut, but still retaining the haunted personality (if not the gritty funk), the album sadly went nowhere in the United States and Europe. AllMusicGuide