Tate Sanderson grew up in Encinitas, where his mom ran Janice Lee’s School of Ballet. Sanderson went on to play with surf band the Pumps, punk-metal-surf rockers Saints We Ain’t, and classic rock group Dirty Looks, who were signed to the Sony Rockworld label and landed videos on MTV.
Saints We Ain’t toured extensively but eventually split. Sanderson DJ’d in Los Angeles for KCLA as "Little Man Tate" and performed solo before returning to Encinitas and taking a job teaching music to special needs children. After around 15 years, he relocated to Hawaii and wrote a book, Johnny Rock Tales from the Road: A Life of Rock n Roll, which he also developed as a documentary video. In addition, he formed the Johnny Rock Band.
After returning to California, he put together an audio and video recording studio in his mom's old Encinitas ballet school, now renamed Music Music Studios, where he created viral hit songs such as “Hot Dog On A Stick.”
Summer 2020 saw the release of a new autobiographical single, “Back In Encinitas.”