A lightning strike sparked the fire that spread through Monastic Studios, Damian Lazarus’ recording space of more than a decade.
Damian Lazarus has shared that a fire spread through his studio in Tuscany over the weekend, destroying cherished recording equipment and more than a decade of memories.
On Saturday, August 8, Lazarus shared images of ashen keyboards, metronomes, and other studio equipment damaged in the Monastic Studios blaze in a carousel post on Instagram. “A lightning bolt hit the studio which started a chain of events that led to the entire room going up in smoke,” he wrote. “Thanks to amazing fire-resistant sound proofing I had installed, the frame of the building remains intact as the fire eventually put itself out as there was no oxygen inside.”
In Mixmag‘s December 2015 cover story, Lazarus said that he and his partner at the time had bought an old monastery in Tuscany the year prior. The space’s history surely inspired his decision to name it Monastic Studios. It was there that he worked on his 2018 studio-length album Heart of Sky with The Ancient Moons, as well as his solo albums Flourish and Magickal, which respectively came out in 2020 and 2025.
Lazarus has opted to look at the fire through a philosophical lens. He wrote, “I’m devastated of course but I’m reminded that everything is impermanent … As a wise Buddhist once said ‘The barn has burned down. Now I can see the moon.'”
Damian Lazarus finished one last track at Monastic Studios before the fire, which he shared is still set for release sometime before the end of 2026. Meanwhile, his tour takes him on a run of dates through Spain and Greece over the next month, before he touches down in Chicago for a set at ARC Music Festival on September 7.
