Dennis Callaci

Dennis and Allen Callaci started the band Refrigerator in 1990. The trio featured Man is The Bastard's Joel Connel early on before a line up change that saw Chris Jones, (a childhood friend and musical collaborator with the Callaci's) take over on drums in 1992. The trio added Daniel Brodo on bass in 1995 and of late additional guitarist Mark Givens of Wckr Spgt joined in 2022.

Callaci founded and has operated Shrimper Records since it’s beginning in 1990. Shrimper started out as a cassette-only label with releases by Nothing Painted Blue, Sentridoh, Goosewind, Buzzsaw, Wckr Spgt and others as well as issuing the first releases by The Mountain Goats, Amps for Christ, Herman Dune, The Woods,Kevin Morby and a myriad of others. The artists on Shrimper own the rights and masters to their music; there are no contracts, just handshakes.

Callaci recorded solo records under the nom de plume Paste in the the 90's. Since then he has released a number of solo records as well as collaborative records with Simon Joyner, John Davis, Heimito Kunst, L. Eugen Methe and others. In 2026, all five members of Refrigerator joined Amy Maloof of Falcon Eddy, Sam Sousa and Writer Jonathan Lethem to form a band called The Disassociation.

Raised in Upland, Claremont’s local college station, KSPC 88.7 FM was formative as a teenager for Callaci. He had a radio show there from 1990-2000, In 2022 he began doing a show there once more with his old friend Bill Chen. The show, Bill Chen Vs. Dennis Callaci airs every Wednesday from 9am to noon.

Pomona was the hub for not just a whole cadre of artists on Shrimmper, but so many other local artists. The dA Center for the Arts (formerly The dA Gallery) continues to be a flagship for many of the authors and artists on Shrimper, and Callaci has been part of ongoing music related events there including The Sound of Pomona which tracked the history of the Teen Latino rock and roll music scene from the late fifties to the mid seventies.

In tandem with these ongoing musical projects, Mark Givens and Callaci started the book imprint Bamboo Dart Press in 2020. They have issued nearly seventy books as of 2026 from a wide swath of artists, writers, painters and musicians. The majority of these artists make their home in The Inland Empire.

A production company called Dirty Opera was formed by Eddie Gonzalez, OFF! Guitarist Dimitri Coats and Callaci in 2025. Dirty Opera has been involved in a number of sell out motion picture screenings at The Claremont Laemmle featuring a panel of filmmakers and actors as well as musical events including bringing the legendary Souled American to Folk Music Center in 2026.

Photography by Catherine Guffey