Craig Nicholls

Craig Nicholls
Nicholls performing in December 2003
Background information
Birth name	Craig Robert Nicholls
Born	(1977-08-31) 31 August 1977 (age 39) Sydney, Australia
Genres	Alternative rock, garage rock revival, post-grunge, grunge (early), indie rock, neo-psychedelia, garage punk
Occupation(s)	Musician, songwriter, artist
Instruments	Guitar, vocals, bass guitar, keyboards
Years active	1994–present
Associated acts	The Vines, Rishikesh, White Shadows
Notable instruments
, Garage Spalt & Scala Custom

Craig Robert Nicholls (born 31 August 1977) is an Australian musician, best known as the lead singer, songwriter, and guitarist of the Australian alternative rock band The Vines, of which he is the only mainstay member.

Nicholls was born in Sydney. Terry Nicholls, his father, was the guitarist and vocalist in a 1960s group named The Vynes. He later worked as an accountant for Sony Music Australia. Nicholls has an older brother, Matt, an older sister, and a younger sister, Jessica. Nicholls' father taught him to play guitar during childhood. He preferred listening to The Beatles, painting artworks, and skateboarding. He stated, "I grew up a loner... I never socialized. I stayed at home and listened to music all day. Music became a mystical world."

Nicholls attended Marist College Penshurst until he dropped out of high school during Year 10. He enrolled in an art school for six months to study painting. He supported his ambition to be a musician by working at a McDonald's in Hurstville. There, he met future band mates bass guitarist Patrick Matthews and drummer David Oliffe. To form a quartet named Rishikesh, Nicholls invited his schoolmate Ryan Griffiths to join on guitar. Nicholls provided the band's name, Rishikesh, from the city in India where The Beatles had attended an ashram. Reviewing early gigs, newspapers would misprint the name as "Rishi Chasms", so Nicholls decided to change it to The Vines, a reference to his father's group.

Nicholls had never written songs until The Vines started playing gigs. Early performances included playing for backyard parties and a regular spot on a local radio station. They gathered a following in Sydney and eventually garnered the notice of Capitol Records. Once he started writing songs, he loved it and continued to write more; the writing was a good outlet for him. Nicholls wrote "Factory", the band's first single, which became NME's Single of the Week in November 2001. At the ARIA Music Awards of 2002, The Vines won 'Best Breakthrough Artist - Single' for "Get Free", which was also written by Nicholls. At the APRA Awards of 2003 he won the 'Breakthrough Songwriter Award'.