If you’re new here, welcome! I wanted to introduce myself: I’m Caleb, a queer, non-binary poet and musician from California, currently serving as San Luis Obispo County’s Poet Laureate.
For the last few years I’ve been splitting my time between California and the UK, as I completed a PhD in Creative Writing in North Wales, where I focused on queer ecopoetics. I love the UK, and hope to settle there in the future, and so you’ll probably see me bopping back and forth a bit.
For now, I live in San Luis Obispo with my wonderful partner John, and our dog Millie. I run a pop-up bookshop called the @slobookbike which puts on readings and workshops free for the community. And I write my little poems, and write my little songs, and occasionally venture out to read them and play them for people. I teach English at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, which is how I make my living.
I live a really privileged, beautiful life, and I’m very grateful. Also: the world is a vampire— luxury communism now! Up the punks!
If you want to support my work, the best things to do are:
1. Buy a book or album. Links in lmy bio.
2. Share a song or poem on your socials.
3. Come to a reading or show.
4. Come to a book bike pop-up or reading!
4. Thoughts and prayers. ✌🏼
Thanks for following along. See you around. 😘
Stone Age Is Back is my third solo album and it is officially out today on Royal Oakie Records.
I have so many people to thank, but first, the personnel:
Drums: Aaron Kroeger
Bass: John Pomeroy
with Adam Nash (guitar on Awooo! Slate Age, Love Lies, Big Soul), Kevin Middlekauff (bass on Love Lies), Lorenzo Cortese (saxophone on Quartz Age, Her.Ther. and Big Soul).
Recorded and mixed by Jay Pellicci at Brothers Chinese.
‘Love Lies’ mixed by Peter Guiser.
Mastered by Amy Dragon at Telegraph Mastering.
Album photography by Caleb and Aidan Dillon. Layout and graphic design by Aaron Kroeger. Video content by Caleb and Aaron.
Anything like this is a collaboration between so many people, and there are always so many friends helping along the way. Thanks to Kevin for countless hours in the backyard, talking shop and helping grow the project. Thanks to John and Aaron for playing these songs all over the world with me— it’s a slog and I appreciate you. Thanks to Heather, Kelsey, Noah, and Josh for acting in our videos. Thanks Drew, Katie, and Jason for letting us use your spaces for filming. Thanks Griffin and Counter for the great live session. Thanks to Ctrl_P as well. Thanks to David at Royal Oakie for taking this record in and helping us make it real. Thanks to Jay Pellicci for making the recording end possible— love you dude! Thanks Finn for letting me use your voice on “Her.Ther.Every.Wer”. Thanks Montenegro Fisher for leading the workshop in St. Tysilio’s Church which I sampled at the end of “Stone Age Is Back”. And thanks to@my fwends who pway twains with me: all aboard!
Thank you to John for everything good in my life and for supporting me through all of my creative manias: I love you more.
I’m sure I’m forgetting lots of people’s help… but I just want to say thank you to everyone who has helped support my work in any way: thank you from the deepest part of myself. I hope you enjoy the new songs.
🫡💠🌐✴️🪦❤️🔥🐺
"Stone Age Is Back" by Caleb Nichols is now available at stores in the UK/EU via @cargoindependentdistribution ✨
Look for the album at your local record store and save on shipping by ordering now at link in bio🔗
To celebrate the expanded release of Stone Age Is Back , @zedpudding made this lyrics vid for ‘Quartz Age’. It’s fun to watch the buildings fall 🏭 And its fun to watch the machine get my lyrics wrong 😑 Watch the whole thing at the link in my bio.
"Stone Age Is Back" by Caleb Nichols will see an expanded UK/EU release on May 1st via @cargoindependentdistribution ✨UK/EU customers can pre-order now at link in bio🔗
Stone Age Is Back, the third solo album from singer-songwriter and poet Caleb Nichols is a fascinating and urgent addition to his growing catalog. Like a PhD dissertation in contemporary indie rock and alt-folk, the album pulls from disparate strands of Nichols’ universe to form an amalgam of queer ecology, rustic punk, existential folk, frenetic indie pop, spoken word, experimental jazz, and Neil Young-esque shredding.
The new LP is a meditation on grief— but not in the ways you’d expect. Across thirteen dynamic and lovingly produced indie gems, Nichols interrogates the grief, guilt, complicity, joy, anger, fear, and dissociative feelings that come along with living through a mass extinction event. Stone Age Is Back isn’t really a political album, or an album explicitly about the climate crisis—rather, it’s an album that explores what it means to be living and dying right now, in this moment of extraordinary change.
“...quietly devastating.” - Psychedelic Baby Magazine
“...psychedelic textures, indie-rock grit, and folk-rock warmth entwine seamlessly.” - Last Day Deaf
It’s trans day of visibility so I’m just popping by to say, this is what (this) trans (non-binary) person looks like. It took me a long time to get here. I’m a work in progress.
Photo by my dear @matthieu.gill
🏴 🌼 💎
Chuffed to bring the Eons Tour to Cymru!
At Focus Wales I’ll be joined by @kevatollah_frewmeini and @choiatone as the band; we’ll do some music and some poetry; at Aber I’ll be on my own reading poems, and in Bangor I’ll be solo but will do a bit of music and read poems, along with @rhystrimble .
Reading from my last pamphlet with @brokensleepbooks as well as my upcoming collection from @harboreditions 📖 playing songs from my @royaloakie LP Stone Age Is Back.
It’s really exciting to be working in this intersection of music and poetry— every time it gets a bit more interesting, and closer to something I’ve got rattling around in the back of my mind.
Photo by @matthieu.gill
✨ Poetry Reading at SLOMA ✨
Join us for an evening of powerful words and community as we welcome CAConrad to San Luis Obispo for the very first time.
📖 Featuring readings by CAConrad, Valentine Freeman, and Caleb Nichols
📍 San Luis Obispo Museum of Art
🗓 Thursday, April 9
⏰ 5:30–8:00 PM
Hosted in collaboration with the San Luis Obispo County Poet Laureate, Cal Poly Writers At Work, and SLO County Arts, this night celebrates poetry, ritual, and embodied language.
CAConrad has been writing poetry for over 50 years and practicing (Soma)tic poetry rituals for more than two decades. Their latest book, Listen to the Golden Boomerang Return (Wave Books / UK Penguin, 2024), continues their groundbreaking work.
✨ This reading is part of a two-part series — don’t miss the Somatic Workshop with CAConrad on Tuesday, April 7.
Free and open to all. Come listen, feel, and be moved. Link in BIO to reserve your spot.
It’s @bandcamp friday and all three of my solo LPs are in stock. I just discovered 10 copies of Stone Age Is Back, which I thiught had sold out! Please enjoy.
Photo of me at the Barras on expired film by @noxious_gearhulk
I can’t tell you how I feel / my heart is like a wheel?
Some faves from last month, doing shows and recording music. First one by @matthieu.gill and also one in Oxford by @ianhanhamphotos 🏴 🏴 ❤️
