Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Particle Kid Or Prodigal Son?
Micah Nelson opens Outlaw Music Festival in Rogers
Arecent headline simply referred to musician Particle Kid as “Willie Nelson’s son,” which is kind of confusing when you consider that the mellow patriarch of Outlaw Country has eight kids.
Aside from the last name and a fairly strong resemblance, Micah Nelson, the youngest of the Nelson kids, has a style all his own.
“I find it kind of funny when people expect me to be a carbon copy of Willie Nelson. It’s like, first of all, there is one, and he did Willie Nelson perfectly. There’s no point in trying to emulate or copy that, especially when it wouldn’t be true to my own life experience,” the youngest of Willie’s sons relates.
Rolling Stone describes Particle Kid as a “trippy troubadour” who makes “low-fi, dreamscape music.” While his music differs from his dad’s in many ways, the famous guitar picker did lead his son’s early guitar lessons.
“I think the first thing he taught me was the Django Reinhardt kind of chords and like a couple of little scales and things that were in that vein,” Nelson explains.
“A lot of what I learned from him guitar-wise was just [through] watching and observing and just loving his totally out-of-the-box phrasing and just [his] approach to the guitar and trying to soak up as much as I can. I still do every night. I just try to learn from him by watching him.”
And while it may seem that his name was an attempt to distance himself from his father’s lineage, the truth is funnier.
“I was maybe 14 or 15. I just got back from school. I think I was playing Mario Kart on the Nintendo 64. And my dad came out of his poker room. And he was kind of standing there watching me for a minute, and I looked up at him, and he said, ‘Welcome home, Particle Kid!’ and walked out,” he says.
“I thought it was hilarious and so weird… but it just kind of stuck with me. When I started recording and writing music, I called the project ‘Particle Kid.’ When it started picking up steam, I was talking to [my dad] and he asked me why Particle Kid? What does that mean? And I reminded him of that moment, and at first, he didn’t remember it,” Nelson says.
“Then he called me back. He’s like, ‘I remember now. I was trying to say welcome home, Prodigal Son!’”
The prodigal son penned a tune for his father last year called, “Die When I’m High (Halfway to Heaven).” Micah wrote the lyrics as a young Willie, and took the song title from another quote attributed to his dad: “If I die when I’m high, I’ll be halfway to heaven.” Willie also performs the song with his youngest.
Micah also animated the video with his wife, Alexandra Dascalu-Nelson. The pair regularly animate videos for Particle Kid’s music and have made videos for Neil Young, Eddie Brickell and others.
“That was something we sort of pivoted to doing when the pandemic hit,” he says.
“We keep discovering new techniques and processes as we go. I did an animated film for Neil Young for the re-release of his album that came out in 1982, called ‘Trans.’ It’s like a dystopian sci-fi rock opera. And that was originally meant to be a film. And so he asked me to make the film, which never had been made. So that was a fun project that’s going to be coming out on his ‘Archives II’ box set at some point.”
In addition to making videos, the Particle Kid creates visual art. He made the poster for his solo tour and is part of the Moonlight Arts Collective, an art community founded by Incubus lead singer Brandon Boyd, who is also a painter and art enthusiast.
He’s also still working on music. “I just finished a new record. It’s called ‘Evil Weirdness,’ and I’m hoping that my label puts it out,” he laughs. “I’m working on a bunch of different things right now. But mostly, I’m focused on playing these Outlaw tour shows and staying alive.”
Which means being on the road with his dad.
“It’s a great opportunity to play music with my dad, while he’s still around playing music,” Micah Nelson says. “It’s just a bonus that they wanted me to open the show with Particle Kid. … That’s a win-win where I can play my songs, and it’s really just for me an excuse to be out there supporting my dad and getting some good hang time in with him.”