Rockland Road: It’s Music, but Really All About Family

Rockland Road is a musical group that includes a husband and a wife, Paul and Jamie Martin, and their four children, March, Kell, Texas, and Tallant. They are a family and love making music together, which just comes naturally.

Paul has been a musician for most of his adult life growing up with a father who had an office job and a mother who was a homemaker, in a home that had a music studio in the basement.

Jamie grew up with music all around her with a father, Duane Allen who is the lead singer for the Oak Ridge Boys, and a mother, Norah Lee Allen, who sang as a backup singer at the Grand Ole Opry for 40 years.

So you see, March, Kell, Texas, and Tallant, could only do as their parents did, and that was to follow in musical footsteps.

“It started out of pure innocence,” said Jamie who remembered March was 12, Kell was nine, Texas was four, and Tallant was three. “It started with harmonies when they were younger. We were just sitting around playing one night at the house which is something we’ve always done. We started learning the songs, and Paul suggested we book a little show for fun and that is how it began,” said Jamie. 

Before they knew it, they were singing for local events. They would play gigs as a family in between Paul’s fulltime career as a musician on the road with Marty Stuart.

Earlier in Paul’s music career, he was the lead singer and lead guitarist for the pop country group Exile, which had a popular hit, “Kiss You All Over”, in the 70s. Exile went on to make 12 number one country songs in the 80s, and remained together through the 90s. After Exile stopped touring, Paul played a time with Kathy Mattea and even played with the Oak Ridge Boys.

“I met my future in-laws while Exile played shows with the Oak Ridge Boys, before I met my wife,” said Paul. “I invited Jamie and her brother to a concert and later she invited me to a Christmas concert her dad’s group was doing. We have now been together for 32 years, and will have been married for 28 years in June.”

Family life continued after the birth of each child. Paul continued to tour fulltime and was away from home a lot while Jamie worked in sales. When the family was together at home, it was not unusual for Paul to be sitting on the couch playing music and one of the kids breezing through the room singing harmony. It was good family time together. Those moments were ones both Paul and Jamie cherished, but always ended the same way with Paul having to return to the road for his job.

Paul enjoyed success as a professional musician while on the road. He even pursued a notable solo career but everything kept leading back to one thing . . . family. The importance of family had always been significant to him especially in his 20s when his mother was diagnosed with cancer, right after he joined Exile. She died before knowing he ever had a hit single.

 “She said she would stay alive to see me when I made my first number one hit,” said Paul. “After her death, I started to realize there is a lot more to life than being a star and having money in the bank . . . there is family.”

Although the life of a musician is what he enjoyed, Paul also enjoyed spending time with his family, and knew he needed to make a change,

“I looked at Jamie and said, ‘I don’t want to wait until my children are 30 years old and ask, why didn’t we do this?’. When I was out on the road, I was missing out on time with my kids and I didn’t want to do that. I thought why not do this with the kids and see where it goes?,” said Paul.

Paul left the road traveling with Marty Stuart in 2015 to perform with his family fulltime. Where it led was the formation of Rockland Road. Paul joked that starting the band with his family brought back memories of when he started in his first rock band as a teenager; he was starting over. The only difference this time was he was not a teenager.

What is it that makes a family of six decide to take to the road and start traveling together as musicians?

“We just felt like they (the kids) were very serious about it. They were not just picking around on their instruments. They were really singing and understanding harmonies,” said Jamie. “All four kids play instruments, write, sing lead, and sing harmonies (all six members do lead and harmonies). March, Paul, and Tallant are multi-instrumentalist. We have never had to hire a band because we are the band. We are self-contained.”

The group’s sound is a combination of country, pop, R & B, classic rock, gospel, and Americana music. They describe Rockland Road as a vocal-driven, melodic band with a signature sound as rich and authentic as its namesake. 

To set the wheels in motion of the band, Paul and Jamie started to homeschool all four children after giving each an opportunity to attend public school. The family has been homeschooling for more than 10 years. March (25) and Kell (22) are homeschool graduates and Texas (17) and Tallant (16) are a junior and sophomore, respectively. Homeschooling has opened the doors for the family to travel, perform, and create freely.

“When we started singing together, people were like, do you understand how rare this is? Nobody is doing this now. All six of you singing the six-part harmony. All the kids playing the instruments,” said Paul. “It’s normal for us. I guess it is kind of cool. We started getting gigs and playing at a lot of churches and local places.”

The kids even had an early stint of celebrity appearing on the Marty Stuart Show. Other television appearances for Rockland Road included Country’s Family Reunion, the Gaither Homecoming 25th Anniversary Special, Larry’s Country Diner, and the Grand Ole Opry.

You may be wondering how they came up with the name Rockland Road. Well, the band was not always called Rockland Road. They used to be known as The Martin Family Circus, a name jokingly coined by friend Vince Gill referring to the family that had grown to four children since he last saw them. Ironically, Jamie was also a fan of the Family Circus comic strip, so the name just stuck.

As the band became more experienced and with the growth of their children and the seriousness in their musical skills and performance, Paul and Jamie thought it was time for a name change and rebranding of the group. By that time, the children were playing with the skill of seasoned musicians.

“All four of them are very personable and their music and social skills have grown. We have raised them and allowed them to be kids and do fun things with their friends. But when we are in a professional situation, we always taught them it is time to be serious,” said Jamie.

Rockland Road is the name of a street in Hendersonville, Tennessee. On Rockland Road is where Jamie’s father purchased and renovated an old tile factory turning it into a recording studio and publishing company. It later became the Oak Ridge Boys headquarters and music studio. Ricky Scaggs bought it in 1998 and it is now Skaggs Family Records.

“All my life, I have known music on Rockland Road. That is where the music got started and we have even recorded in that studio,” said Jamie. “Music is still being made there. So five years ago, we decided to change the name to Rockland Road.”

Rockland Road now tours fulltime. Many days and nights are spent together traveling in a bus. As a family, they do it all. They are booking agents, travel agents, bus drivers, mechanics, equipment managers, road managers, talent/artists, merchandisers, and so many other jobs.

“It is our lifestyle, and it is not for sissies. It is a very tough life; you are on the road a lot, almost a gypsy lifestyle,” said Jamie.

“I have always equated what we do is very similar to a farming family because everybody has to participate for us to “bring the crop in”, so to speak. It takes all of us to pull it off,” said Paul who added he and Jamie both come from families of tobacco and cotton farmers.

Paul is the bus driver when they travel and it is during that time the front passenger seat is filled either by Jamie or one of the children, leading to good intimate family conversations.

Rockland Road is six people who are very similar in ways, but very different in many ways.

“Everybody gets along most of the time. Sometimes, we are like okay I need to be by myself for a while,” said Jamie who noted she and Paul do not really ever argue.

“Every once in a while, the kids get sideways with one another. As they have gotten older, they have become more mature emotionally,” said Paul who shared that is even evident when it comes to the success of the band. “Everyone wants the best thing at the end. There are no egos, and we talk it through and decide what will be best for the band and the record.”

When not performing, music is still quite prevalent in their lives. Paul and both of the boys have recording studios. March does ad work for an ad agency as does Paul. Kell is a music collector. The children all enjoy hanging out with friends. Paul is a big University of Kentucky basketball fan, and they enjoy watching sports and cooking together.

“We see the talent in all four kids, but we try to teach them it is great to have the God given gift of music ability but, without a work ethic behind it you won’t go very far. Our kids have seen examples of talent without a work ethic. With homeschooling, they are observing life in real time and living it now. It is a dose of reality,” said Paul.

Paul and Jamie never set out with their family to be celebrities or rock stars. They have been approached to do a few reality television shows, but decided not to pursue those options.

“We believe music has healing power. We have gotten to travel with our family full-time for the last eight years and have spent pretty much 24/7 with our kids and are still not tired of it. We get to play some pretty cool events together, and everyone continues to grow as writers, artists, singers, and musicians, and it is just so much fun,” said Paul, who with Jamie hopes the music is always something that gives them a reason to come back together as a family.

Jamie added about the music and their concerts, “We strive to bless people with our music, and we’ve been told many times it is refreshing to see a family working together, hanging together, and making some fun music together. We want people to be uplifted and feeling better than they did when they arrived,”

As Rockland Road travels across the country, they approach each performance the same way.

“We want to approach our shows like we are coming to see friends. When they see the taillights of the bus rolling out of the parking lot, we want them to say, ‘Man we had a great time with them. They did a great show, and we are going to have to do this again’. That is very important to us. We are just thankful they are paying us to do something we love,” said Paul who shares a bit of wisdom from his father. “If you can make a living doing what you love, you are a millionaire.”

You can see Rockland Road, featuring Small Shack in concert this weekend at the Hardeman County Arts Council.

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