Michael Nesmith

Nesmith was born in Houston on December 30, 1942. He was an only child, his parents, Warren Nesmith and Bette Nesmith (née McMurry), divorced when Nesmith was only four. Following the divorce, Bette raised Nesmith as a single mother. Bette McMurry took jobs involving clerical work to design work, Over the next 25 years, Bette Graham (she had remarried in 1962) built the Liquid Paper Corporation into an international company, which she sold to Gillette in 1979. She died in 1980 at the age of 56. he left high school without graduating and enlisted in the U.S. Air Force in 1960. He completed basic training at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, was trained as an aircraft mechanic at Sheppard Air Force Base in Wichita Falls, Texas, and was permanently stationed at Clinton-Sherman Air Force Base near Burns Flat, Oklahoma. ==Music career==

After Nesmith's tour of duty in the Air Force, his mother and stepfather gave him a guitar for Christmas. Learning as he went, he played solo and in a series of working bands, performing folk, country, and occasionally rock and roll. He enrolled in San Antonio College, where he met John London and began a musical collaboration. They won the first San Antonio College talent award, performing a mixture of standard folk songs and a few of Nesmith's original songs. Nesmith began to write more songs and poetry, then moved to Los Angeles and began singing in folk clubs around the city. He served as the "Hootmaster" for the Monday night hootenanny at The Troubadour, a West Hollywood nightclub that featured new artists. Randy Sparks from the New Christy Minstrels offered Nesmith a publishing deal for his songs. Barry Freedman told him about upcoming auditions for a new TV series called The Monkees. In October 1965, Nesmith's confident, carefree and laid-back manner impressed the producers and he landed the role as the wool-hat-wearing guitar player "Mike" in the show, which required real-life musical talent for writing, instrument playing, singing, and performing in live concerts as part of the Monkees band. Nesmith's "Mary, Mary" was recorded by the Paul Butterfield Blues Band, then by the Monkees themselves on their second LP in 1967, and subsequently reworked by rap group Run DMC in the mid-1980s. His "Different Drum" and "Some of Shelly's Blues" were later recorded by Linda Ronstadt and the Stone Poneys, in 1967 and 1968 respectively. "Pretty Little Princess", written in 1965, was recorded by Frankie Laine and released as a single in 1968 on ABC Records. Later, "Some of Shelly's Blues" and "Propinquity (I've Just Begun to Care)" were made popular by the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band on their 1970 album Uncle Charlie & His Dog Teddy. Nesmith next joined his fellow Monkees for the 1986 "Monkees Christmas Medley" video for MTV appearing throughout dressed/disguised as Santa Claus until the finale, when he revealed his identity to all. In 1989, Nesmith reunited with the other members of the Monkees: Micky Dolenz, Peter Tork, and Davy Jones. Prior to the official kickoff of The Monkees '89 tour (on July 1 in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada) all four Monkees gathered in Los Angeles, California, making two live radio appearances (KLOS-FM: The Mark and Brian Show on June 28 and KIIS Radio on June 30) to promote their reunion concert at the Universal Amphitheatre on July 9, 1989. The following day, all four band members were in attendance as the Monkees received a Hollywood Walk of Fame star. In 1995, Nesmith again reunited with the Monkees to record their studio album (and first to feature all four since Head in 1968), titled Justus, released in 1996. He also wrote and directed a Monkees reunion television special, ''Hey, Hey, It's the Monkees''. To support the reunion, Nesmith, Jones, Dolenz, and Tork briefly toured the UK in 1997. the trio performed 27 songs from The Monkees discography ("Daydream Believer" was sung by the audience). When asked why he had decided to return to the Monkees, Nesmith stated, "I never really left. It is a part of my youth that is always active in my thoughts and part of my overall work as an artist. It stays in a special place." In 2016, Nesmith contributed to the Monkees' 50th anniversary album Good Times!. He additionally contributed a song, "I Know What I Know", and was reportedly "thrilled" at the outcome of the album. Despite not touring with Dolenz and Tork for the majority of the Monkees' 50th anniversary reunion in 2016, Nesmith did twice fill in for the ailing Peter Tork and appeared for the final show of the tour. It was the last time the three surviving Monkees performed as a group. In 2018, Nesmith and Dolenz toured together as a duo for the first time under the banner "The Monkees Present: The Mike and Micky Show". The tour was cut short four dates out due to Nesmith having health issues. He was flown back home to undergo quadruple bypass surgery. He contributed two songs to the Monkees' 13th studio album, Christmas Party (the group's first Christmas album), released on October 12, 2018. In 2019, Nesmith and Dolenz reunited again to make up the cancelled dates of the tour and adding several more dates, including a planned tour of Australia and New Zealand. Nesmith and Dolenz announced a follow-up tour, "An Evening with the Monkees", to begin in early 2020. The tour was delayed, however, due the COVID-19 pandemic. It was announced by Nesmith and Dolenz on May 4, 2021, that the Monkees would disband following a farewell tour. Dubbed "The Monkees Farewell Tour", the tour consisted of over 40 dates in the United States from September to November. However, because of restrictions due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, they were not able to play shows in Canada, the UK or Australia. The final date of the tour was held on November 14, 2021, at the Greek Theatre in Los Angeles. ==Solo career==

" single with the First National Band (1970) As he prepared for his exit from The Monkees, Nesmith was approached by John Ware of The Corvettes, a band that featured Nesmith's Texas band mate and close friend John London. London played on some of the earliest pre-Monkees, Nesmith 45s, as well as numerous Monkees sessions, and had 45s produced by Nesmith for the Dot label in 1969. Ware wanted Nesmith to put together a band. Nesmith's interest hinged on noted pedal steel player Orville "Red" Rhodes; their musical partnership continued until Rhodes's death in 1995. The new band was christened Michael Nesmith and the First National Band and recorded three albums for RCA Records, the first two issued in 1970 and the third released in 1971. Nesmith's First National Band is now considered a pioneer of country-rock music. Nesmith wrote most of the songs for the band and he is considered one of the trailblazers of country rock. He also had moderate commercial success with the First National Band. Their second single, "Joanne", hit number 21 on the Billboard chart, number 17 on Cashbox, and number four in Canada, with the follow-up "Silver Moon" making number 42 Billboard, number 28 Cashbox, and number 13 in Canada. Two more singles charted ("Nevada Fighter" made number 70 Billboard, number 73 Cashbox, and number 67 Canada, and "Propinquity" reached number 95 Cashbox), and the first two LPs charted in the lower regions of the Billboard album chart. No clear answer has ever been given for the band's breakup. Nesmith followed up with The Second National Band, which consisted of Nesmith (vocals and guitar), Michael Cohen (keyboards and Moog), Johnny Meeks (of The Strangers) (bass), jazzer Jack Ranelli (drums), and Orville Rhodes (pedal steel), as well as an appearance by singer, musician, and songwriter José Feliciano on congas. The album, Tantamount to Treason Vol. 1, was a commercial and critical disaster. Nesmith then recorded ''And the Hits Just Keep on Comin''', featuring only him on guitar and Red Rhodes on pedal steel. Nesmith then became more heavily involved in producing, working on Iain Matthews's album Valley Hi and Bert Jansch's L.A. Turnaround. Nesmith was given a label of his own, Countryside, through Elektra Records, as Elektra Records's Jac Holzman was a fan of Nesmith's. It featured a number of artists produced by Nesmith, including Garland Frady and Red Rhodes. The staff band at Countryside also helped Nesmith on his next, and last, RCA Victor album, Pretty Much Your Standard Ranch Stash. In the mid-1970s, Nesmith briefly collaborated as a songwriter with Linda Hargrove, resulting in the tune "I've Never Loved Anyone More", a hit for Lynn Anderson and recorded by many others, as well as the songs "Winonah" and "If You Will Walk With Me", both of which were recorded by Hargrove. Of these songs, only "Winonah" was recorded by Nesmith himself. During this same period, Nesmith started his multimedia company Pacific Arts, which initially put out audio records, eight-track tapes, and cassettes, followed in 1981 with "video records". Nesmith recorded a number of LPs for his label, and had a moderate worldwide hit in 1977 with his song "Rio", the single taken from the album From a Radio Engine to the Photon Wing. In 1983, Nesmith produced the music video for the Lionel Richie single "All Night Long". In 1987, he produced the music video for the Michael Jackson single "The Way You Make Me Feel". PopClips and MTV, Elephant Parts, and Television Parts During this time, Nesmith created a video clip for "Rio", which helped spur Nesmith's creation of a television program called PopClips for the Nickelodeon cable network. In 1980, PopClips was sold to the Time Warner/Amex consortium. Time Warner/Amex developed PopClips into the MTV network. Nesmith's most recent Pacific Arts project was Videoranch 3D, a virtual environment on the internet that hosted live performances at various virtual venues inside the ranch. He performed live inside Videoranch 3D on May 25, 2009. Movies and books Nesmith was the executive producer for the films Repo Man, Tapeheads, and Timerider: The Adventure of Lyle Swann, as well as his own solo recording and film projects. In 1998, Nesmith published his first novel, The Long Sandy Hair of Neftoon Zamora. It was developed originally as an online project and was later published as a hardcover book Nesmith's second novel, The America Gene, was released in July 2009 as an online download from Videoranch.com. Recent history In the early 1980s, Nesmith teamed with satirist P. J. O'Rourke to ride his vehicle Timerider in the annual Baja 1000 off-road race. This is chronicled in O'Rourke's 2009 book Driving Like Crazy. During the 1990s, Nesmith, as trustee and president of the Gihon Foundation, In 1992, Nesmith undertook a concert tour of North America to promote the first CD release of his RCA solo albums (although he included the song "Rio" from the album From a Radio Engine to the Photon Wing). The concert tour ended at the Britt Festival in Oregon. A video and CD, both entitled Live at the Britt Festival, were released capturing the 1992 concert. Nesmith continued to record and release his own music. His final album, Rays, was released in 2006. In 2011, he returned to producing, working with blues singer and guitarist Carolyn Wonderland. Nesmith produced Wonderland's version of Robert Johnson's "I Believe I'll Dust My Broom" on her album Peace Meal. Wonderland married writer-comedian A. Whitney Brown on March 4, 2011, in a ceremony officiated by Nesmith. In 2012, Nesmith briefly toured Europe prior to rejoining the Monkees for their tours of the United States. Intermixing the Monkees concerts, Nesmith also launched solo tours of the U.S. Unlike his 1992 U.S. tour, which predominantly featured music from his RCA recordings, Nesmith stated that his 2013 tour would feature songs he considers "thematic, chronological and most often requested by fans". Chris Scruggs, grandson of Earl Scruggs, replaced the late Red Rhodes on the steel guitar. The tour was captured on a live album, Movies Of The Mind. In 2014, he guest-starred in season four, episode nine, of the IFC comedy series Portlandia in the fictitious role of the father of the mayor of Portland, Oregon. In 2018, he announced that he would be doing a five-date tour of California with a revamped version of The First National Band, including a date at The Troubadour, where he performed before The Monkees. On February 20, a tour was announced as "The Monkees Present: The Mike and Micky Show", their first tour as a duo. The pair would play Monkees music and promote the tour under the Monkees banner, but Nesmith stated, "there's no pretense there about Micky and I [sic] being the Monkees. We're not." The tour was cut short in June 2018, with four shows remaining on the tour schedule due to Nesmith having a health issue. Dolenz and Nesmith rescheduled the unplayed concerts plus adding several other including an Australian and New Zealand tour in 2019. After recovering from his health scare, Michael Nesmith and the First National Band Redux went on a tour of the U.S., with mostly the same lineup and setlist as the southern California shows. In 2019, Nesmith toured in a two-piece configuration with pedal steel player Pete Finney, focusing on his 1972 album, ''And the Hits Just Keep on Comin'''. This was the first time Nesmith had performed in this format since 1974 with Red Rhodes. Nesmith was also joined by special guests Ben Gibbard and Scott McCaughey on opening night in Seattle. ==Personal life==

Nesmith was married three times and had four children. He met his first wife, Phyllis Ann Barbour, in 1964, while at San Antonio College. They had three children together: Christian, born in 1965; Jonathan, born in 1968; and Jessica, born in 1970. Nesmith and Barbour divorced in 1972. Nesmith also had a son, Jason, born in August 1968 to Nurit Wilde, whom he met while working on The Monkees. From 1976 to 1988, he was married to his second wife, Kathryn Bild, a screenwriter and television producer. In 2000, he married his third wife, Victoria Kennedy. The marriage ended in divorce in 2011. When the Monkees' TV series ended in 1968, Nesmith enrolled part-time at the University of California, Los Angeles, where he studied American history and music history. In 1973, Nesmith founded the Countryside Records label with Jac Holzman, the founder of Elektra Records. In 1974, Nesmith started Pacific Arts Corporation and released what he called "a book with a soundtrack", titled The Prison, as the company's first release. Health and death Nesmith was forced to cancel the last four dates of his 2018 tour with Micky Dolenz due to a "minor health scare". In an interview with Rolling Stone published on July 26 of that year, Nesmith said he had undergone quadruple bypass heart surgery, and had been hospitalized for over a month. Nesmith died from heart failure at his home in Carmel Valley, California on December 10, 2021 at the age of 78, less than a month after his final performance. His family said in a statement: “With infinite love we announce that Michael Nesmith has passed away this morning in his home, surrounded by family, peacefully and of natural causes.” ==Discography==

Source: • The Wichita Train Whistle Sings (1968) • Magnetic South (1970) • Loose Salute (1970) • Nevada Fighter (1971) • Tantamount to Treason Vol. 1 (1972) • ''And the Hits Just Keep on Comin''' (1972) • Pretty Much Your Standard Ranch Stash (1973) • The Prison: A Book with a Soundtrack (1974) (soundtrack) • From a Radio Engine to the Photon Wing (1977) • Live at the Palais (1978) • Infinite Rider on the Big Dogma (1979) • Tropical Campfires (1992) • The Garden (1994) (soundtrack) • Timerider: The Adventure of Lyle Swann (2000) (soundtrack, recorded 1980) • Rays (2005) • The Ocean (2015) ==Filmography==

Television Films Home video ==Books==

:(n.b. books proper – not including The Prison and The Garden) • The Long Sandy Hair of Neftoon Zamora (1998) ==References==