Lucas Nelson is ready to make a name for himself

Even if you cannot name a song from Lucas Nelson, there is a possibility that you have already heard his music.

36-year-old singer-songwriter (and the son of country music is the mainstay Willy nelson) Not only has he been releasing the country-heal albums with his band The Promise of the Real, he is visiting and recording with his band. Neil Young Since 2016. Nelson also wrote for the screen: in 2020, he won A Grammy For his work on a small film A star is bornFor which he wrote and co-produced several songs, as well as on the screen as a member of Bradley Cooper's band.

Despite all these appreciation and achievements, Nelson has a serious vision for himself. He would like to graduate from a player behind his favorite country's favorite country artists-in a top-out superstar in your AAP in a top-bill superstar.

There is no reason to think that he will not complete this moment. Nelson's first single album, American romance (Manufactured by shooter Jennings, son Velon), Is working with universal comments about love, loss, family, perseverance and cycle of birth and death. It is all set against dinner counters and truck stops, East Coast Turnpike Exit and Snow-Its Montana Mountains against a classic American background. Under the leadership of Nelson's acoustic fingerpicking and aching, Ready Vocals, American romance A time-to-time towns van goes down with a familiar ease of a time-wheel town zandt record to separate itself in the modern-country scenario.

Beyond the release of his album on 20 June, Nelson spoke on time about Long Road to Two American romanceFinding the right way to discuss his dynasty, and when it comes to politics, why is it “disciple of Dolly Partane”.

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Time: American romance Your debut album is being deployed, but you have already released some albums with your band Lucas Nelson and Promise of the Real. Can you walk me through that transition?

Nelson: Okay, Real's promise was a band I started at the age of 19. I was always a lyricist, and they traveled with me through thick and thin. We became the backing band of Neil Young for five years. Then we are trying to stretched our songs and Neil's songs and that line. But a lot of fans we met was Neil's fans and of course, my father. Eventually I realized, if I do not install myself as an artist right now, I will not be able to.

So I just decided to go out and play for my fans and my generation and discovered who I am. I just had to become Lucas Nelson. I stopped smoking weeds, I calmed down. I had to face my fear of flying as a pilot. And I let a lot of heritage ideals, with whom I grew up and he felt pressure.

There is a song on the album – this is the first song that I had ever written, when I was 11 years old, called “You Wet It”. I wrote that before I started telling myself a story about who I was. That song came to me in a school bus. My father liked it very much that he recorded it. Chris Christophysson then said, “I like that song very much. Are you going to be a lyricist?” I said, “I don't know.” He said, “Okay, you have no choice.” This inspired me to become a musician. But now I am trying to ask myself: what do I mean?

How do you feel American romance Can you start answering that question?

I am working with some of my favorite musicians of my time: Stephen Wilson Junior, Sierra Pharel, Anderson East. “God did not do,” I wrote with Aaron Riter, which was just a hit with Ella Langley and Relay Green with “You Look Like You Love Me”. I'm writing a lot with Ernest [Keith Smith]Which has written all number one hit on Morgan Waln's recent album. I have always believed that I can stand a toe with someone as a lyricist. I am a lyricist and first and foremost – I play a good guitar, and I sing well, and I perform well, but the songs are the most important thing that has brought me A star is born And what really, I think, the reason for the indigo [Young] To take notice.

You have artists like Casey Musgravs, Zach Bryan, Chris Stapletton, Tyler Children – These are the artists I respect, and I want to be a part of that conversation and music landscape. I want to make a career that lasts as my father. And when my father played, he played for his generation, and he now followed him in the nineties. So for that longevity, I have to be smart and play with my people.

I always go and honor [Shooter] For his music. I always wanted to work with him. I think it was now the right moment, as he is installing himself as an incredible manufacturer from his heritage. Now I think the conversation is less, “Oh, isn't it good that these children are doing it and their father were friends?” It gets a bit piece on the cake. Those who do not know us will probably still see it in this way. And this is something that I deal with my whole life. [But] We have achieved the idea that we are only sons [Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings]We have our career that we have made.

I respect [Shooter’s] work ethic. When I started playing with the band, we did 250 shows in a year for a good part of 10 years, just to prove ourselves. I knew that I was going to work hard twice. Those who do not know me always have an opinion on whether I have got anything, but I know how hard I have worked, and so in the moment of my death, this is what I am going to see. I can see that the shooter has only one view.

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I can imagine that you are having many different internal conversations with yourself. Like on one side, when Chris Christophyson tells you that you were born to become a lyricist, it is surprising. At the same time, like any family business, did you feel that there was any option at ever?

I am very grateful that they gave me that inspiration because it lit the fire. And I was confident to say this, “Okay, keep your head down, ignore everything else and just working and just working, and I think I have some congenital understanding about this song writing that I can really nurture.” I am really grateful to the 11 -year -old boy who understood that the time he takes will pay now. And this is.

It was just about closing my ears for any nonsense and playing the guitar for eight hours a day, and through the night, for my mother's lamp, and simply focus on song writing, not to fuck about parties in high school. Until I was in college, I had never had a sip of beer. I just focused. The biggest part about being my father and my mother's son [Annie D’Angelo] Also, there was inspiration and support. Colonel Tom Parker looked at Elvis and said, “I am going to focus on all his efforts on the man,” he invested and made him a star. So someone has to make you champion, and I was lucky that he was growing up.

Yes, it is a two -edged sword. It is said that you have no industry connection and want to make it as an artist, you need Any To take a chance on you. Meanwhile, as you have described, you say that you come from a family Everyone Connection- Some still have to vach you personally, because people will make perceptions.

Now I have reached this place, where I think I am sufficiently clear to understand how to talk about it. I really didn't know what I was feeling. I was in my Beatles Hamburg days – after the show was playing the game after the show. And when people ask me [about my father]I would like, “I don't even have time to answer it. Ask me about my record.” You know what I mean?

I love my father and he is a good man, and I love my mother and she is a good woman. And my brothers and sisters. This is a good family. I am lucky Not because he is a successful musician, because he is a good person and a kind person and is in contact with his sympathy. This is what I am the most grateful.

How did you settled in the name of album American romance,

The title came from the song, [which is] Like a picture. This entire album is a group of separate chapters, which is in a John Steinbeck Travels with CharlieMemorial [way] About various moments that grew up in this country, which raised me. Love and disadvantage and heartache, and then allen. There were moments where I have spent thanksgiving dinner due to being a turkey special at a truck stop, and then the kind waitress looks bad for me, although she was also working. It is Walmart Parking Site. It is siren at night, randezavas at night. In the journey of hundreds of hours, I have a thousand different stories, but I tried to put it in the album of only 13 songs.

At the same time, it is an album about the future. I found a song called “very much”, which talks about how I imagine my death hour and I hope what is for me in terms of love and relationships. I would like to be surrounded by my family and they strictly want all the information about how I met the love of my life, which is there next to me, and when I fell in love, I was telling all different stories. It is about future and past and present.

You divided your time between Nashville and Hawaii, and between Hawaii and Texas when you were growing up. When people ask, where do you say that you are from?

I was raised by the United States by the United States. Roads picked me up. Maybe I was born in Texas, and I spent some time there. I spent some time in air. But most of my lives were spent from Walmart Parking to Motal, from hotel to dinner to the stage growing. It is easy to say that more and more than the United States is to say in specific anywhere.

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The music of the country has such a legacy of telling a story about America, which surrounds good, bad, worldly. But 2025 is such a unique time to release a body of work about the country, given that the country is rarely divided. As is someone who has traveled to it on a large scale, there are some similarities that you think every person living in America still shares?

This is a great question. I believe that we all share hearts. There is a song I called “Turn of the News (Build a Garden)”. “I believe that every heart is kind, something is simply used a little less” is the first line. I think when we can connect with our hearts, we can open sympathy inside us. Now, there are exceptions to the rule. Obviously some people are sociopathic. Therefore, I think music feels that music has the power to cut from mind and reach heart. We can all be related to love and relationships and heartbreak. Those things are really universal.

I believe that I can change the minds of people more, which I do by standing and giving statements. I can put it in my music. I believe that firmly, and I have seen it working. There is a boy named Derryl Davis who is a black composer, and he has replaced more than 200 Kleinmen, at the point where he gives him his hood because he was sitting there and talked to him. This man has some balls. He somehow reached his heart.