Caleb Shomo says the response to him coming out has included a lot of homophobia, and calls it sad.
Caleb Shomo has spoken at length about the year that produced Pure Ecstasy, the record that led him to come out, and the reaction he has had from part of Beartooth‘s audience since.
The singer announced on 23 May that he is a proudly gay man, three months before the album arrived. Speaking to “The Break Down With Nath & Johnny“, he said the writing came first and the decision followed from it.
Shomo had spent about a year writing material he now recognises as avoidance.
“The whole process was very just completely in the moment with very little thought about the future, to be completely honest. There was this whole period for about a year of just very, very creative exploration, musically, that I was going through on my own a little bit more. And the biggest, I guess, issue I kept running into is I kept wanting to just write very broad and nonspecific lyrics trying to capture an emotion of some kind, and trying to manifest things in my life. I’m realizing now that I was really just… That’s what I was doing — I was trying to manifest things, and I was trying to manifest strength in my life and empowerment. So, I had this whole phase where I was just writing these songs that were just these lyrics that are just, like, kind of blindly empowering, which was cool and it was fun, and it made for some really interesting stuff. But the truth was I was just afraid. And I knew what I should write the record about. And when [‘Pure Ecstasy’ co-producer] Jordan [Fish] came into the picture, that’s when it all changed,” he said (as transcribed by Blabbermouth).
Fish, formerly of Bring Me The Horizon, turned up at his house with an afternoon free.
“When [Jordan and I first] worked together, I’d already been out to some friends and family for a few months at that point,” Shomo continued. “And we got together, and he happened to be in town and happened to be free, and we’d wanted to work together for forever, and we hadn’t yet. And he was, like, ‘Do you have an afternoon?’ I was, like, ‘Absolutely. Let’s f**king work.’ So he comes over, and just like any situation with a co-write or working with anybody else that I ever get myself into, if it’s for Beartooth, we just sit and drink coffee and f**king talk, and just talk about what I’m going through, talk about what I’m listening to. We talk about them. We talk about all this s**t. And obviously, that comes up, as that had been kind of, like, the main thing going on in my life and the main thing I was dealing with. And he really encouraged me to write about it, and directly write about it. Because in that moment, if we were writing anything else, it wouldn’t have been worth our time. And, yeah, then we wrote ‘Free‘, and that song changed everything.”
Fish then heard everything Shomo had written and told him it wasn’t good enough.
He added: “I showed [Jordan] my entire body of work. I sent it to him, and he got to live with it for a while. And after that session, he called me, I think, a couple of weeks later, and we had a really, really honest conversation about all the music that I had been working on, and he just gave me some really good insight where he’s, like, ‘Dude, this is super cool and really, really creative and really out there. But looking from the outside at what Beartooth is, and after working with you and knowing what Beartooth is, this is not a Beartooth record. What a Beartooth record is to me, to what I assume most people who listen to it or know anything about it, and to you, if I go through the history of the band, is it’s you taking a really hard and honest inward look about the things you’re struggling with and talking about them very candidly and very openly, and you’re just not doing that with any of this stuff.’ And he was, like, ‘I can tell you from experience, as much as doing these really creative, out-there things is important for you as a musician and as an artist, you’re going to regret this in the long run if you stamp a Beartooth title on this and call this a Beartooth record.’ And I agreed. And we talked about how scared I was, and we know the truth, we know what this record needs to be about, and that’s, I believe, when I asked him to be a producer on the record, like full-blown 50/50, man. Like, ‘I need you to co-produce this with me for real.’ And he said yes, and he came back over to the States for about five or six days, and we just went on a f**king crazy run. We wrote ‘Beautiful Again‘, we wrote ‘Eyes Closed‘. Within 48 hours, those were done. ‘Lose You To Find Me‘ was another one we wrote, just like that. And then, yeah, after that, we spent about three weeks on Zoom and FaceTime while he was in England, ’cause he was working on other s**t, and he’s got a family and a life. And I’d just wake up at, like, 5:00, 6:00 in the morning, and we’d work all day, and rewrite the old stuff, and work on the lyric and the melody and everything to bring it into what’s really happening.”
Shomo said the public announcement was about controlling the timing rather than any plan.
“Honestly, I was just dealing with so much in my life and my personal life and the weight of that album that I just kind of turned the f**king blinders on and just ran, and just ran full speed. And then it was done, and I just f**king turned it in after I mixed it and was, like, ‘This is it. I’m not changing anything. I’m not giving myself a chance to get scared of this thing. This is just what it was. This was the moment. It’s meant to be. I just have to let go.’ And then all this s**t happened, and my life exploded, and it became very public. And I just felt like I wanted to address what was going on before it got addressed for me. And that was that. And here I am today,” he said.
He first told people in September 2025. “Free” came out at the end of the following February, and by then he had decided how he intended to present himself.
“And I had already decided, like, I’m not gonna water myself down at all. I’m going to just do what I wanna do. I’m gonna wear what I wanna wear. I’m gonna sing how I wanna sing. I’m gonna look how I wanna look and just enjoy being an artist that’s allowed to do that, and that has the freedom to do that. And that was met with a lot of opposition and a lot of… I mean, really, just a lot of homophobia, and a lot of people who really were not okay with me presenting that way at all with what I was doing, any of it. And it was just kind of sad, I guess, is probably the only way to put it.”
It landed in the middle of the biggest run of shows the band had played, direct support to Bad Omens in sold-out arenas, with Sleep Token‘s labelmates President opening.
Shomo continued: “And at that point in my life, aside from the band as well, I was going through so much that I just decided I just wanted to like get off the Internet for a while, which I did. Because I was, like, ‘You know what? I have a lot of things I have to tend to. I am on this tour.’ I mean, we were on the biggest tour we had ever done. We were direct support to Bad Omens in sold-out basketball arenas with President opening. Like, this is a big f**king deal and a big tour, and we’re playing with incredible bands, and I gotta be on top form. And it was tough. It was a tough tour. I mean, a lot of the day I’d be spent in a really, really bad place and just trying to find enough energy and enough will to get myself warmed up and get on that stage and do my f**king job. And it didn’t really change as we kept releasing more songs, and the very vocal opposition continued and still continues to. And, yeah, me coming out didn’t help that. And just being honest with people about who I am and what’s been going on and what this record’s about on a deeper level. And, yeah, the truth is I have no idea how it’s gonna go. I’m trying, as of right now, to just keep my focus very narrow. I’m trying to keep my focus on training for tour, on knowing that whether people show up or not to these shows, I’m going to give them the best show that I possibly can, and I’m working on a new record. And I have a lot that I need to say and a lot that I need to process and work through, and that’s the only way I can do it. So I’m just trying to think baby steps.”
Asked whether there had been discussions within Beartooth about the likely fallout, Shomo said there had not.
He replied: “Um, not necessarily. At the time it was just about… ‘Cause obviously they knew — they knew what was going on with me, and they’re some of the first people I told. And I think more than anything, all that we were focused on as a band was just the record and the music. And Oshie [Bichar] for a few records now, has kind of taken on this executive producer role almost, kind of like in a Rick Rubin sense, where he, from a distance, will just be absorbing everything, and then when he feels like he really has something that needs to be said, he’ll come to me with it and make suggestions, maybe it being track listing or parts or moments or whatever. All we were focused on was the music. And they knew what it was about. They’ve been in this band long enough to know me and know how I make these records and why I make these records and what it does for me and my life. And I think the reality is none of us were thinking about fallout at all. None of us were thinking about anything but the music. And do we love the music? Do we love this record? And are we gonna be excited to play this thing for the next year, year and a half, however long this record cycle is? And we were, and we were stoked, and had a great time making it, and felt really proud of it. And then ‘Free’ happens, and it was just a real eye-opener.”
Shomo‘s wife of nearly 14 years, Fleur Shomo, posted her own statement shortly after his, asking the band’s audience to keep supporting him.
She wrote at the time:
“Not really sure how to start this cause does anything even need to be said? But I guess I’ll just dive right in.”
“The past few months have been a very disorientating and hurtful time to navigate. For both of us. But I will always want to love, protect and support Caleb. I have cared more about his well being over the years than anything else in the world.”
“To see the confusion and pain he went through and the highs and lows and wanting to help but not knowing how. You never want anything more for your person than for them to just be ok. You also ask yourself constantly if you’re a bad person for wondering wtf this means for your world & the anger you also feel. I am the only person that is having to deal with the duality of this situation. To support him whilst losing everything has been incredibly hard to figure out. You can love and support your person through the hardest time in their life, whilst also be completely demolished & lose yourself at the same time.”
“You question everything. But I have learned the one thing I don’t need to question is our history. No matter what anyone will say, I know it.”
“I have always wanted nothing more than for Caleb to be happy. Trying to help him go through this without having any idea what to do, has been a learning curve we never expected to experience together. The isolation of not being able to talk to people about this has been profound, as it has not been my story to share. My mental health has suffered & I have had moments where I have not felt or acted like myself. For those that have known & been there, thank you. I’ll never be able to repay your kindness.”
“Our nearly 14yrs of marriage was wonderful and full of so much fun, adventure & love. Nobody will know anything about our marriage like we do. And no one can ever truly know what depths of love exist between two people unless they are those people. I already miss it & my husband more than anything. Our story was a good one. And now it’s done.”
“I hope anyone in the world going through this finds hope & courage & I hope the fans can continue to support Caleb.”
“For now I’m going to keep focusing on what I can control & continue living my life trying to achieve what I want to achieve. And if I keep saying hi to as many dogs as possible along the way, then I’m sure things will slowly get better, day by day, piece by small piece, bird by bird.”
Pure Ecstasy came out on 28 August through Fearless Records, Beartooth‘s sixth album and their first for the label, following 2023’s The Surface. Shomo wrote, recorded and largely produced it, with Fish co-producing and Periphery‘s Misha Mansoor contributing to the title track.
It marks a first for a band Shomo founded in Columbus in 2012 and initially played every instrument on himself: drummer Connor Denis performs across the whole record, much of it in complete takes at NRG Recording Studios. Oshie Bichar plays bass, with Zach Huston and Will Deely on guitars.
The previous Beartooth albums are called Disgusting, Aggressive, Disease, Below and The Surface.
“The Pure Ecstasy World Tour” opens in Europe on 17 September. The North American leg starts on 11 November in Boston, plays Hammerstein Ballroom in New York on the 12th and finishes at the Hollywood Palladium in Los Angeles on 18 December, with Don Broco, Magnolia Park and Windwaker supporting the US dates.
