Nearly anyone who’s had their had their hand in the music industry in the last ten years is familiar with Butch Walker. The Atlanta-bred jack-of-all-musical-trades has been clawing his way to notoriety since his teens and coming up on his 39th birthday, he’s not even close to stopping now. Popwreckoning’s own Joshua got the chance to chat with him recently and he had some fantastic insight to offer on all that he’s done.
Starting in the hair-glam days of the early nineties, Butch first burst on the scene as the guitarist for Southgang, having a minor hit with “Tainted Angel.” When that failed due to grunge taking the world by storm, he and friends Mitch McGlee and Jayce Fincher regrouped and formed Floyd’s Funk Revival. But it wasn’t until the boys formed The Marvelous 3 in the mid to late nineties that they tasted true fame. The song “Freak of the Week” from their second record (and first major label release), Hey! Album, climbed the modern rock charts to hold a top 5 spot.
The band was playing 250 shows a year, landed performances on all the late night shows and Walker was a Calvin Klein model (on a personal note, that ad still makes me swoon). While it seemed that they were having the time of their lives, you may be surprised to find out otherwise. “I hated the fact that we spent pretty much our whole existence chasing a pop song, chasing a hit,” says Butch, “That’s just no way to live your life. I had to jump through all these hoops after the song became successful instead of just being a band and making music…there’s just all this pressure on you for people to approve of you and I just hated that.” But don’t worry, Marvie fans, it wasn’t all bad: “The band was fun, the songs were fun, [and] for the most part playing shows was a blast. ”
After their 3rd album failed to make a splash, and much mistreatment by their record label, the band decided to call it quits and since, Butch has released 4 full-length solo albums, including this month’s Sycamore Meadows, not to mention EPs, live albums, and 2 live DVDs. “I think the success as an artist for me is from just being self-satisfied with where I am in my career. Not necessarily monetarily or you know, popularity-wise, but knowing that I’ve come this far in my life and still make records and still have a good little dedicated fan base that will come see me play my show and I still get to play in front of a crowded house every night.” In addition, he’s also found time to write and produce for Avril Lavigne, Pink, Midtown, Bowling For Soup, Fall Out Boy, Sevendust, and The Academy Is…, to name a few.
Although his solo work is brilliant, and he’s gained a loyal and steadily growing fan base, it’s the writing and producing that’s put him on the map. “Most people don’t know who I am as a singer or artist. You know, on a general pop level. Doing records for other people just kinda came naturally for me. I became more known as being a producer and a writer.” If that’s not a way to utilize all of your talents, I don’t know what is.
It’s long been the opinion of many that the record industry is in big trouble, but for Butch Walker, that doesn’t mean that musicians are in big trouble. According to him, websites like MySpace and our own, much-loved PopWreckoning, are the best thing to happen to music. “Everybody has the ability to put records out and make their voice heard and sing how they want. Some kid on a website is going to have more influence than some crusty, 85-year-old A&R guy that is out of touch with reality and music anyway. Now stuff that is amazing music, that would’ve never been heard before because the stiff suits didn’t really even want to give it a chance are realizing that this is what people really want to hear.”
But don’t take that to mean that everything that’s coming from the Internet is good. “It doesn’t mean that everything is good. We still have to counter-balance our fair share of bullshit. We’re going to have some really bad pop and bad hip-hop.” Therefore, Walker is careful about what he puts his name on. “I’m really proud of what I’ve done and the people I’ve worked on records for. If I had to do the Pussycat Dolls all day long or something like that, I’d probably shoot myself in the head. Which, you pretty much hear it all the time anyway if you turn on pop radio.”
As for the future of Butch Walker? “It’s wide open,” he says. “I would like to just keep making music and doing it the way I want to and have every record evolve from something and that something to lead to the next because I don’t want people to ever be bored.” And thus far, we haven’t been bored with Walker. From the high-energy rock Left of Self-Centered, to the glitter sprinkled The Rise and Fall of Butch Walker and the Let’s-Go-Out-Tonites, he’s always offering us something new. “I’d rather people love it or hate it, but not ignore it.”
Walker won’t be going away quietly any time soon. Want to catch him live? Rumors of a large tour this spring have been floating around the PopWreckoning world, but we can’t promise anything yet! Just know that Butch Walker has much more in store for the music industry on and off the stage.
Butch Walker: website | myspace | Sycamore Meadows review
Photos: Lucia Holm
Pingback: Butch Walker @ Hotel Cafe, Hollywood CA | popwreckoning
Pingback: Butch Walker Covers Taylor Swift ‘You Belong with Me’ | popwreckoning
Pingback: Night 3: Butch Walker @ Hotel Cafe, Hollywood CA | popwreckoning