R.I.P Chris Cornell: Soundgarden and Audioslave Frontman Dead at 52

Soundgarden and Audioslave frontman Chris Cornell is dead at 52 of an apparent suicide. The Wayne County medical examiner’s office ruled the death a suicide by hanging. At this time, a full autopsy has not yet been completed.

A representative for Cornell, Brian Bumbery, released a statement that said the death was “sudden and unexpected.”

Soundgarden had just performed at the Fox Theater in Detroit this past Wednesday night, and were slated to perform in Columbus, Ohio, on Friday at the Rock on the Range Festival.

Spokesman for the Detroit Police Department, Dontae Freeman, said that officers were called to the MGM Grand hotel and casino at midnight in response to the suicide of a white male according to The New York Times. The man in question was not immediately identified, but his date of birth was listed as July 20, 1964 (the same date as Cornell’s).

The man’s wife had reportedly contacted a family friend to check on him, and then found him unresponsive on the bathroom floor with a band around his neck. The suicide victim was pronounced dead at the scene.

Cornell had been posted to social media in the hours before he died, announcing that the group had arrived in Detroit, as well as posting a 2012 release, “By Crooked Steps,” to his official Facebook fan page.

The rocker had a lifelong struggle with drugs and admitted this in a Rolling Stone interview, calling himself a “daily drug user at 13.”

Following Soundgarden’s disbandment in 1997, Cornell fell back into heavy drug use and told The Guardian in 2009 that he had been a “pioneer” in Oxycontin abuse and had ended up in rehab.

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Chris cornell, Audioslave, Soundgarden