Butch Walker spent years as a struggling musician before finding success as a singer-songwriter and producer of acts like Avril Lavigne and Katy Perry. Suddenly flush, he moved into a 5,000-square-foot house in Malibu, nearly two years ago, and was planning to buy it, but last November a wildfire destroyed the home, and almost everything he owned.
It must have been difficult to watch coverage of the recent California fires.
It was around this time last year when the Santa Ana winds came to Malibu. I was home then, and the fires were two miles away, but I felt this would never happen to me. Cut to 8:30 a.m., last Thanksgiving weekend. Im at a hotel in New York after playing the night before. I get a call from my friend Johnny, who said my neighborhood was on fire.
What was the house like?
It felt like a French country house. It was very much a bare-bones house, but beautiful, and on three and a half acres of landscaped countryside.
Did you take to the Malibu lifestyle?
I loved it. I walked around barefoot. I had a beautiful year getting to enjoy the fruits of my labor.
But the loss inspired you musically?
One of the first songs I wrote was called Going Back/Going Home. It was something I took for granted. When you dont have a home to go back to, youre just going back to a place.
