Dave Grohl Remembers Friend and Collaborator Mark Lanegan

In the wake of the passing of grunge legend Mark Lanegan on Tuesday (February 22), many have spoken out about their relationship with the throaty singer.

Now, famed Foo Fighters frontman Dave Grohl has added his thoughts.

Speaking to The Independent, Grohl, who worked with Lanegan in the rock group Queens of the Stone Age, said, “[His music] was so pure and so real. If he sang about pain, you believed it, and if he sang about love, you believed it.”

Grohl continued, “If you know anything about his story, or have read any of his books, you’ll understand why he sang what he did and why he sang it the way that he did. There was nobody like him. In Seattle, he was much loved.”

Lanegan, who rose to fame as the frontman of the grunge group Screaming Trees, was a member of Queens of the Stone Age from 2001 until 2005. Grohl played with the band in 2002 and later in 2013.

Speaking to the outlet, Grohl continued talking about when he first met Lanegan. “When I first joined Nirvana I was living with Kurt [Cobain] in our tiny apartment—one weekend he said, ‘Hey, I’m gonna go up to Seattle for the weekend and hang out with a friend, do you want to come?’ We went up to stay with his friend Dylan and we went to a show,” Grohl said. “I passed out on the couch and woke up in the morning and opened my eyes and Mark Lanegan was sitting in a chair right across from me. His first words to me were, ‘Who the f**k are you?’”

Grohl added, “I had just discovered his first solo album, which is a f**king masterpiece. It’s one of my most influential records. I didn’t necessarily know him as the Screaming Trees singer, I just knew him as himself. It’s heartbreaking.”

Check out Grohl and Lanegan performing together in QOFTA from a 2002 show below.