Beartooth’s Caleb Shomo Comes Out Ahead of Pure Ecstasy Album

Caleb Shomo made a direct statement to his followers on Saturday morning. The Beartooth frontman posted a message to Instagram that opened with eight words: “I am a proudly gay man.” He wrote that speculation surrounding his personal life had reached a point where he felt compelled to speak, before it affected the people close to him.

The post arrives weeks after Shomo stepped back from social media. In February, Beartooth released the single “Free” and its music video, a clip that showed the singer with a new look. The visual and the shift in sound drew homophobic comments online, and Shomo subsequently removed himself from those platforms. Now he explains that the upcoming album, Pure Ecstasy, was written with a single rule in mind: no watering down, no hiding, full expression.

He connects that artistic decision to a longer private reckoning. His earlier records, he notes, were rooted in religious guilt, self-hatred, depression. Those themes no longer felt like the whole truth. “I spent a decade burying feelings with alcohol,” he wrote, “and honestly when I decided to put it down and focus on exploring why I felt this way for so long, it’s been a direct path to me reconciling with my sexuality.”

The statement gives context to the band’s recent announcements. A new album and a Fall 2026 US tour are on the books. Shomo’s words make clear that Pure Ecstasy is the first Beartooth project built around these realisations, rather than the suppression of them. It also reframes the earlier silence: what looked like retreat was invention, an attempt to finish something honest without the noise.

He closed by encouraging anyone struggling to give themselves grace and to do the hard work he avoided for years. The message is personal, but it also sets the terms for how this next chapter of the band will be heard.