Suicide: Chris Cornell's demise

Chris Cornell,  a Grunge icon, died on 18th May and a police report established the cause of his death to be suicide by hanging . He was 52 years old. It seems that Cornell used an exercise band to do the deed. Almost immediately after the report was made public, Cornell's wife Vicky,  understandably distraught, issued a statement to the effect that she did not believe that  he had really intended to take his own life.  He had taken too many Ativan pills, an anti-anxiety drug, therefore his judgement was impaired and his suicide 'involuntary'.
RIP Chris Cornell.
Like all fans, I am devastated by the news of Chris Cornell's death. He was a hero of mine.
I did not grow up with Grunge, I was already very much a grown up in 1994, when the Black Hole Sun music video was constantly broadcast by MTV. My (then) young son loved it and could not be torn away from  the TV set whenever it was played. I liked it too, it is so weird and hauntingly beautiful, very different from the usual staple of that era .



Later, in his teenage years, my son became a grungie and  played a lot of Soundgarden, very loud, in his room . I got to know the sound of Seatlle,  grew to love this music and began to listen to it myself. It was music that really resonated with me.
I went to see Soundgarden in Hyde Park in 2012.  It was a great gig. One of my favourite Soundgarden's tracks is Slaves and Bulldozers, which was the last song played by Soundgarden in concert, a few hours before Cornell killed himself.  But there are many others I love, not to mention Cornell's singing with Temple of the Dog and Audioslave and his solo numbers.
A tragic end seems quite befitting to a Grunge star - I am saying this without wanting in any way to sound cynical. After all Grunge music is very dark and the song lyrics are quite grim. But of course one should not conflate performance with  real life.



Cornell is not the only Grunge star to commit suicide. Kurt Cobain of the legendary Nirvana ended it at age 27, leaving a suicide note that read: "I don't have the passion anymore and so remember, it's better to burn out than fade away. Peace, love and empathy. Kurt Cobain". Both Cobain and Cornell had a history of drugs and depression, still, Cornell managed to hang on to his life for another quarter of a century. That is remarkable.
What really strikes me, in all this despondency,  is the desire to deny that Chris Cornell actually wanted to die. The suicide of a loved one is devastating, there is no doubt about that. But it is also true that suicide is a taboo in our society and our attitudes to it are very muddled, just as every case of suicide is complex and different. It is extremely difficult for us to accept the suicidal intention. Our Judeo-Christian heritage does not allow us to view suicide as a choice and there have been times when suicide was regarded as a criminal act, with consequences. Obviously you cannot punish someone who has committed suicide. But there were clear rules - and in some places they are still enforced - about the burial of suicides and economic sanctions to heirs. Some insurance companies do not pay up if the cause of death is voluntary suicide.


I have been reading the provocative book by Simon Critchley on suicide, which he discusses from a philosophical viewpoint. I would recommend it. It is not an apology of suicide, but Critchley makes the very valid point that "To be human is to have the capacity, at each and every moment, of killing oneself. Incarceration, humiliation, disappointment, disease - the world can do all of this to us, but it cannot remove the possibility of suicide".
It seems fair to say that the act of suicide is never rational but it is nevertheless a choice.
In the end, I find the  comments by Critchley on  another famous suicide, that of Virginia Woolf, very uplifting: "it is not Woolf's suicide that grants her life coherence. The coherence is provided by the subject of her work and what she wrote about life. This matters much more".
It is something we should remember about Chris Cornell and his music.

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