The widow of Soundgarden and Audioslave frontman Chris Cornell, Vicky Cornell, has given her first interview since her late husband’s death, saying that “he didn’t want to die”, despite his death being ruled as suicide.
Speaking with People, Vicky Cornell says her husband wasn’t of “sound mind” on that night in May when he was found dead in the bathroom of a Detroit hotel room.
“If he was of sound mind, I know he wouldn’t have done this,” she says. “My Chris was happy, loving, caring and warm. This was not a depressed man — it wasn’t like I missed that. What I missed were the signs of addiction.”
Mrs Cornell says her husband hadn’t relapsed into drug abuse since 2009, but she’s now considering that she might have missed clues that he was struggling with drugs again.
“I relaxed, I guess,” she says, noting that the grunge icon was prescribed the sleeping aid Ativan last yet but recently seemed sleep deprived.
“That was a sign something was off,” she says.
Mrs Cornell says that after Soundgarden’s Detroit show, Chris woke her up by remotely turning the lights in their home on and off using his phone. She called him and “he was on a rant”, she says.
“I said, ‘You need to tell me what you took,’ and he just got mean. That wasn’t my Chris.”
Chris Cornell was then found dead by his bodyguard Martin Kirsten, who told Vicky Cornell that the singer was taking double his usually dose of Ativan. Cornell’s toxicology report showed multiple prescription drugs in his system at the time of his death.
“Addiction is a disease,” Mrs Cornell says. “That disease can take over you and has full power.
“I’m going to do everything in my power to make sure other children don’t have to cry like mine have cried.”
Vicky Cornell’s interview comes after Chris Cornell’s two daughters Toni and Lillian released emotional open letters about their father earlier this month. Chris Cornell’s final music video was also released around the same time.
