Gunnar and Matt Nelson Open Up About the Legacy of Their Father, Ricky Nelson, and Grandparents, Ozzie and Harriet (Exclusive)
- - Gunnar and Matt Nelson Open Up About the Legacy of Their Father, Ricky Nelson, and Grandparents, Ozzie and Harriet (Exclusive)
Virginia ChamleeJanuary 9, 2026 at 5:00 AM
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Courtesy of Gunnar and Matt Nelson
Gunnar, Matt, and Ricky Nelson -
Gunnar and Ricky Nelson are opening up about life as the sons of pop icon Ricky Nelson — and as the grandsons of Ozzie and Harriet
The identical twins have a new book, What Happened To Your Hair?
In an exclusive interview with PEOPLE, they open up about their father's legacy — and their own
Social media discourse around "nepo babies" may be somewhat recent, but for Gunnar and Matthew Nelson, the conversation is nothing new.
The 58-year-old identical twins are the sons of Ricky Nelson — a teen idol of the 1950s and 60s who died in a tragic plane crash at age 45 — and the grandsons of Ozzie and Harriet Nelson, the stars of the eponymous television show.
Born to a long line of musicians and entertainers (their great-grandparents were vaudevillians), Gunnar and Matt started writing music at age 6, shooting to fame in their own right after launching hard rock duo Nelson in the early 1980s.
Courtesy of Gunnar and Matt Nelson
Gunnar, Matt, and Ricky Nelson
Today, the Nelsons are listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as the only family to reach number one record status in three successive generations.
But as Gunnar and Matthew — who also perform under the name of Ricky Nelson Remembered, as a tribute to their father — tell PEOPLE in a recent exclusive interview, they still have something to prove.
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"It's been a lifetime of misperception, but ... it's really been a Nelson's job, throughout the last 100 years of entertainment, to make people forget about reality," Gunnar muses. "Our whole family was about making people forget about the bills they had to pay, or the relationship they had that was going down in flames and all that."
But the culture, they note, has shifted — and the two are now ready to open up about their family, their dad's plane crash, and their own journeys in the music industry, in a new book, What Happened To Your Hair?, out December 16, 2025.
"This is really the first opportunity to set the record straight, not just on what happened with our dad's plane crash but also the interesting facts behind our grandpa Ozzy — writing, producing, editing, directing and starring in all 435 episodes of the longest-running sitcom in television history [The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet], and not getting a single Emmy nod," Gunnar says. "Or our father selling half a billion singles and pioneering not only early rock and roll in its formative years, but reinventing himself as one of the first true country rockers — and not one single Grammy."
Courtesy of Gunnar and Matt Nelson
Gunnar and Matt Nelson
As for the "nepo baby" stuff, the brothers are quick to note that they were born into music — but found success themselves, writing and producing their own music since their early days.
Their own life and childhood, they add, was "not Ozzie and Harriet."
"[The book] is our first real opportunity to tell our own story with our own voices and not have some record company person put a spin on it, to try to sell posters," Matt tells PEOPLE.
Ricky and his wife Kristin (who married in 1963 and divorced in 1982) had four children: Gunnar and Matthew, as well as son Sam and daughter Tracy.
The brothers were just 18 when their dad and six others died during the crash-landing of his band's aircraft on December 31, 1985. The plane, a Douglas DC-3, caught fire mid-flight near De Kalb, Texas. Both pilots survived the crash.
Courtesy of Gunnar and Matt Nelson
Harriet Hilliard (aka Harriet Nelson), Ozzie Nelson, David Nelson, Ricky Nelson,
As they detail in the book, they were initially meant to be on the flight, too — until their dad had a change of heart at the last minute, asking them to fly commercial to meet he and his band rather than fly aboard the private flight. They also describe — each in their own words — learning about the plane crash in real time, and the intense media scrutiny that ensued.
One of the most poignant chapters of the book, though, details their final conversation with their father, after he secretly attended one of their concerts, hiding in the back of the venue with a hat pulled over his head.
"You know, the sun was coming up over the valley, and we talked all night and he said, 'I want you to know that I love you, but I admire you as my peers,'" Matt remembers. "You kind of rewind that week — the family was back together, we were all living together, he told that to us and then told us just as quickly, 'I don't want you going [on the plane], meet me there.' He had a feeling, you know ... I believe that God had a little word with him."
The two also touch on other personal topics — their mother's alcoholism and their parents' messy divorce — but the through line, they say, is gratitude.
"It was that love of music and escaping into that and also our relationship with each other that got us through a pretty crappy childhood, to be honest with you," Gunnar says. "And we were kind of born with the attitude of like, 'Hey, what good can we find from this?' And I know it sounds trite, but I think gratitude is everything. It doesn't matter how dark things get and how broke you are — and we've been broker than broke, millions in the hole before — but we've never given up."
Courtesy of Gunnar and Matt Nelson
Gunnar and Matt Nelson
And through it all, they add, they've had each other — and have always been eager to step out on their own terms.
"In Ozzie and Harriet's case... it was all about being a surrogate family for millions of kids out there that perhaps didn't have a great family of their own," Matthew says. "And our dad, you know, he loved rock and roll and we've always loved it too, we had that in common with each other. But the book was almost called The Boys Have Each Other because that was kind of like the buzz phrase around the family."
What Happened To Your Hair? releases December 16, 2025.
on People
Source: “AOL Entertainment”
