Album Notes

Sean Rock began writing songs as a child and hasn’t stopped since. The Arkansas native grew up in the Delta town of Clarendon, where, Sean says, “there really wasn’t anything else to do but sit on the levee and make up songs. My mother and grandmother always sang to me-- Hank Williams, folk songs, The Beatles…. So music became a part of living, really early.”
Sean’s uncle, Sonny “Red” Baker, was one of the early voices of rockabilly in its early days in Helena and Memphis. Sean acknowledges his influence saying, “I remember sitting there, listening and watching his hands bending the guitar strings. I thought that was the greatest thing in the world.”
In time, Sean learned to play the guitar and joined a couple of bands, always concentrating on the songwriting. He cites a broad range of influences growing up, from The Smiths and R.E.M. to Nanci Griffith and The Band.
“That was always the important part for me—coming up with new songs,” he says.
Then, in junior high, a friend brought to school a copy of Steve Earle’s “Guitar Town”. Sean remembers that fateful day saying, “We skipped the rest of the day and listened to the album over and over again. That was when I saw the light, so to speak, and realized that I wanted to be a songwriter and sing my songs for people.”
In recent years, Sean has become a regular in the Little Rock music scene, playing with such folk and rock groups as Two Thumbs, The Rocks and Lookback Marys. His current band is Sean Rock & the Toltecs. The Toltecs include long-time friends Roland Gladden on bass and multi-instrumentalist Jeff Clanton. The recent addition of Crystal Wallis, a classically trained viola player, has added even greater depth to Sean’s performances. On drums, the group has enlisted the aid of Bart Angel, of Big Silver, and jazz drummer Brian Withers.
Sean has opened shows for such national acts as Tom Kimmel, Todd Snider and Levon Helm and was the first solo act to ever reach the finals of the band-heavy Arkansas Times Musicians Showcase. Sean is also a two time finalists in the Arkansas Acoustic Festival, as a solo artist and with his brother Stephen as The Rocks.
Recently, Sean has completed his first solo record, Somewhere From Now and is available on Soundshed Recordings, a label he started with his brother.
Whether alone, as part of a duo, or at the helm of a 5-piece band, Sean Rock creates beautifully exciting, and at times, tragic, melody-driven songs that are at once popularly accessible and artfully crafted.