A micromorphic model of compressible nematic liquid crystals is here proposed in order to revise and extend the micropolar approach which, as here shown, is compatible with incompressible fluid dynamics. On the basis of an expansion of mass density in terms of microdensity, we introduce a density contribution of the free energy which agrees with some constitutive laws pertaining extensions of the classical ”director” theory of liquid crystals. Compressibility is described by a microstretch model which allows to write a set of balance laws comparable with the micropolar approach. Nematoacoustic effects due to the orientation of the wave vector with respect to the nematic configuration are analyzed evidentiating the expected dispersive and dissipative behavior of the admitted wave modes.