I never feel like I have to hang on to the music. I don't expect that the music will go away. Ideas are the only thing I can point to that are permanent and fixed.

 42 Billboard and No. He was an only child; his parents Warren Audrey Nesmith and Bette Nesmith Graham divorced when their son was four. In 1988 following the ending of this second marriage he returned to Los Angeles where he met Victoria Kennedy.

Nesmith is notable as a songwriter including "Different Drum" (sung by Linda Ronstadt with the Stone Poneys) and as executive producer of the cult film Repo Man (1984). He also is credited with creating the genre of the music video. In 1981 Nesmith won the first Grammy Award given for Video of the Year for his hour-long television show Elephant Parts.