Kanye West wanted to turn his Malibu home into a ‘bomb shelter’
Kanye West reportedly wanted to transform his home in Malibu, California into a ‘bomb shelter’.
The news comes from a new lawsuit filed by Tony Saxon, who, as Sky News reports, claims he is owed $1million (£800,000) in unpaid wages and loss of earnings after working as a project manager, full-time security and live-in caretaker at West’s house in Malibu.
Speaking to NBC – who reviewed and confirmed the contents of the lawsuit – Saxon said of the proposed renovations to the house: “We were going to be gutting all of that out and sort of building him a Bat Cave” to “hide from the Clintons in and the Kardashians in,” adding that he wanted to turn the house into a “bomb shelter from the 1910s”.
He added that while he initially thought it to be an “art project”, he realised eventually that “no, he wants to live in here”.
Elsewhere, Saxon said that Kanye “wanted no electricity. He only wanted plants. He only wanted candles. He only wanted battery lights. And he just wanted to have everything open and dark. You can’t keep food in that house, because you had no refrigerator left. You had no windows. I had seagulls flying in.”
He added: “He wants to be on a privatised wifi network. He wants to have an alternate source of energy. He wants to have no doors, no windows, no fixtures, just concrete.”
The lawsuit filed in the Los Angeles Superior Court alleges that the ‘Donda’ artist unlawfully fired Saxon after he refused to comply with Ye’s “dangerous” demands.
Saxon told Sky News that he was instructed by West to remove the electricity supply and windows from the property, claiming Ye “wanted it to be like a bomb shelter”. Quoting the rapper, he said: “‘This is going to be my bunker, my place to go off the grid and hide’.”
According to the lawsuit, Saxon was hired by West in September 2021. His other responsibilities included overseeing construction-related jobs such as cleaning, demolition, hiring contractors and coordinating employees.
Saxon allegedly spent the entirety of his employment at the house “sleeping in makeshift conditions, finding empty spaces on the ground and using his coat as a makeshift bedding”. The property – which West purchased for a reported $55million (£44m) – had previously been stripped out for an extensive remodelling project.
In a previous Instagram post, Saxon shared a photo of a mattress on the floor of a house, allegedly Kanye’s Malibu residence, and wrote: “I was a PRISONER of the house. I couldn’t leave it alone as I was the only one with a key authorised or trusted to live there. I was trapped I slept on a floor.”
Earlier this year, West was accused in a lawsuit of allowing a bullying culture to permeate his Donda Academy, among several other complaints. Ye also avoided battery charges in relation to an incident that saw him throw a woman’s mobile phone in the street.
Last week saw Kanye West share a preview of a new song called ‘Israel’, in which he raps about meeting the devil. According to recent reports, he is preparing to drop new music “imminently”.
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Will Richards
NME
