Video Premiere: Particle Kid “Still Going”

11:15 AM EDT on June 28, 2019

Photo credit: Jason Reidmiller

On July 26 Micah Nelson, who records and performs as Particle Kid, will release his latest album, via OAR. On Window Rock Particle Kid enlisted his longtime touring rhythm section of Tony Peluso (drums, Roland SPDX, Juno 6) and Jeff Smith (bass, OP-1, mini-KORG) for this collection of nine cohesive tracks that meld elements of psychedelia, folk, funk and rock.

Today we premiere the official video for “Still Going” from the forthcoming release. Particle Kid explains, “’Still Going’ is a totally stream of consciousness song... I was at the Hen House one night and picked up an acoustic guitar and this weird F something-or-other chord came out and then it went to an A minor-something and then a G-something.. (these are highly technical musical terms you understand)... and then the number “72” appeared in my head so I said it out loud.. I just kept going and at some point along the thought stream I started thinking about what my first memory ever was and an image of a neon orange squirt gun appeared, partially covered by fall leaves on the ground next to a rusty metal slide at an old playground in Briarcliffe, Texas I used to play at when I was like 3 years old... and so forth...

“The whole song isbasically me writing down my thoughts and memories as they came to me over thethree chords, of being a kid, getting older, not wanting to get older, dealingwith real life things, losing friends to drugs, etc, but trying to maintain asense of curiosity and wonder and love for life through the whole trip. EventuallyI had this oddly nostalgic song, like a music induced hypnotism therapysession.”

As for the origins ofthe video, he notes, “I kept seeing a memory of this old tennis court atPedernales that for some reason I always associate with being a kid in theearly 90s. I’m pretty sure the IRS tried to take it along with everything elseat Pedernales. My friend Miles lived right near there and we were so excitedthat he got Sonic & Knuckles the Sega game for his birthday…See, here I goagain…Anyway I knew I wanted to shoot that tennis court on super 8 for thevideo. For a while the whole video was gonna just be the old half-abandonedtennis court and chain link fence around it and nothing is really happening atall.. a totally minimalist approach.. but then Adam (Stewart) sent me thisunused painted film he had made for some other project but nobody used it andit totally blew my mind…

“I could believenobody wanted this footage! It perfectly captured the abstract realm ofthoughts and pure consciousness, the unified field where this song ‘Still Going’sprouted from.. so ultimately it became a combination of that, some otherfantastic film Adam shot, the super 8 stuff I shot, some old beautifully moldysuper 8 footage that Claude Steinberger (Harlan’s father) shot from this weirdHalloween party in the 60s..Harlan is the kid in the space suit ... plus one ofmy favorite moments from a home video my mom’s longtime Film Trash friend HelenCaldwell (my mom was a hair & makeup artist on many films back in the day)shot on some early camcorder of my brother and I going nuts on these woodenrocking chairs we had in our old house...Me and my brother rockin’ out togethereven way back then!!!

“Even though this song is super personally nostalgic to me, I wanted it to be abstract enough that anyone could associate their own memories and feel something from it... anything at all... I hope that the song and video induces an internal discourse and takes the listener on a reflective journey through their own personal memories, a meditation on the personal mythology of their own lives…

“There’s a lyric at the end “you always said it never ends the joy the pain the sorrow and there never will be nothing left to say” which I think is maybe about rock and roll actually, and how it will always keep dying and keep returning in some other form, because no matter what decade or generation we are in there will always be something to say about it. Then the line “take the best you’ve got today there may not be tomorrow and you’ll always have the best you’ve got today.” It’s kind of funny actually, that line came from my friend Regan years ago when he was talking about how he always smokes his best weed first because that way, no matter what weed he has left, even if it’s shitty weed, he will always be smoking the best weed he’s got. It sounds kinda silly, but it made me think about how that can apply to life in general, not just weed and how my tendency in life had usually been to save the best of anything for last, when actually that was assuming tomorrow was guaranteed and I would always have the opportunity."

Particle Kid will support WindowRock on tour with the Flaming Lips and Claypool Lennon Delirium, with complete datesbelow the video.